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The Proper Way to Help A Turtle Across the Road
A common act of charity on Michigan roads is the occasional stop to help a turtle cross the street so it doesn’t become a road pancake. This is easy enough when the turtle is a small painted box turtle, but it can get a little sketchy when it is a very large, mature snapping turtle….
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How to Tell If the Noises I’m Hearing are Rodents?
Homeowners know that a house makes lots of sounds—anything from the siding expanding in the summer, to attic beams contracting in cooler air, to the mysterious creaking sound of “the house settling”. There are, however, some sounds that are absolutely anxiety-inducing for any homeowner: the sounds of rodents in the house. Perhaps you have heard…
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Identifying a Honey Bee
“Help! I’ve got honey bees in my house!” As summer approaches, we start to get a lot more calls for “bees.” I put “bees” in quotation marks because often “bee” is a catch-all phrase people will use to refer to any and all stinging insects. Yellow jackets, carpenter bees, honey bees, bald faced hornets, mud…
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Explaining Check Valves for Bats
Let’s say you hypothetically noticed a bat or two in your home over the winter and called Northern Pest in the late spring to set up an inspection. Your technician arrives in early June, and writes up a quote, which you consider for a week or so. You decide to move forward with the bat…
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Effective Mouse Control
As winter approaches and the temperature outside drops, we humans like to cozy up inside our nice, warm houses. Unfortunately, so do pests such as mice, squirrels, and raccoons. In Michigan, mice are certainly our biggest wintertime pest concern. Unlike other mammals, a mouse will not hibernate, and mice colonies will remain active throughout the…
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The Insect Freeze-Tolerance Mechanism
With harsh winter upon us, people are desperate for a silver lining. If we must suffer through the polar vortex with its absurd amounts of snow and subzero temperatures, perhaps at least it could mean a reduced insect population in the summer? Will this frigid winter kill off more than the average amounts of insect…
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