While our warm Florida climate is great for living, it also creates the perfect environment for many types of insects to thrive. Below you will find a description of some common household pests that we see here in Florida. When you sign up for a service agreement with PestGuard, you'll never have to worry about meeting any of these creatures in person. We safeguard your home against these pests and prevent future infestations. Call now for a household pest control or termite control quote.
Household Pests
Take a minute to learn about some of the pests that our experts take care of.
The German Cockroach
Found throughout the world thriving wherever man lives, eating the same foods, and sharing the same habitats. Commonly found in restaurants, kitchens, and stores where food, moisture, and harborage are abundant.
Brown Banded Cockroach
Considered harder to control as a result of being scattered throughout the structure. Shows a preference for warmer areas above 80 degrees F. Often found high on walls, in picture frames, behind molding, near appliance motors, and in light switches, closets, and furniture.
American Cockroach
Often invades from sewer systems and heavily mulched areas. Found nearly anywhere in the house and known for contaminating food, carrying disease, and damaging book bindings, fabrics, and wallpaper.
Australian Cockroach
Enters homes through windows, doors, soffits, and gables, especially where moisture problems exist. Breeds and lives outdoors in moist, decaying vegetation. Commonly referred to as "Palmetto Bugs."
Smokey Brown Cockroach
Found in warm, dark, moist areas, such as tree holes, ivy, mulch, woodpiles, and soffits/eaves of attics with moisture problems. Known for being very mobile. Thorough methods and persistence are required for effective control.
Florida Woods Cockroach
Produces a foul-smelling fluid to protect itself from predators. Commonly found in leaf mulch, in wood piles, and under rotting logs. Houses with wood shingles and shade trees will support large populations of this species.
Silverfish
Causes damage by eating food, cloth, or other items high in protein, sugar, or starch. Breeds in bookcases, storage boxes, and linen closets. Thrives in moist, hot areas from the attic to the crawl space.
Flea
Seeks mammals for the blood meal needed to sustain them. Can be a direct health hazard, transmitting diseases and tapeworms.
Tick
Many serious diseases can be transmitted through ticks, including Rocky Mountain spotted fever, typhus, Lyme disease, relapsing tick fever, and other disorders.
Widow Spider
Found commonly in foundations, vents, shrubs, and wood piles at ground level. Contains highly poisonous venom that can cause concern for small children and older or infirm persons. Medical attention should be sought if bitten.
Brown Recluse Spider
Found in undisturbed areas, such as sheds, garages, and dark closets. Their bite causes a severe systemic reaction and an ulcerous sore that requires extensive medical attention.
Clothes Moth
Lays their eggs on products that the larva will consume, such as wool, feathers, fur, hair, animal and fish meals, and milk powders. Not attracted to light, instead preferring dark, protected areas.
Carpenter Ant
Nests in homes with wood damaged by termites, fungi, and moisture. Forages widely for food crumbs and insects, as well as honeydew produced by sap-sucking insects which attack landscape plants.
Pharaoh Ant
Nests in wall voids, cabinets, boxes of food, and any other accessible crevices and spaces. In sub-tropical areas, they readily nest outside in leaf debris found on or near structures.
Red Imported Fire Ant
Lives in colonies of up to 200,000 individuals. Their mounds can be two feet high and three feet across, with as many as 50 colonies per acre.
Wood-Destroying Insects
Powder Post Beetle
Damages seasoned hardwoods used for flooring, furniture, and structural components.
Old House Borer
During quiet times, their feeding may be heard as clicking and rasping sounds. Adults leave infested wood through oval holes approximately 1/4" in diameter.
Subterranean Termite
Feeds on wood or other cellulose materials, such as paper, cardboard, and fiberboard. Responsible for excessive damage in the U.S. every year.
Drywood Swarmer
Swarm in late spring and early summer.
Subterranean Termite Swarmer
Emerge from the colony in a dark cloud at least once per year
