Take It To The Board with Donna DiMaggio Berger
Take It To The Board with Donna DiMaggio Berger
Monsters In The Walls -- Pest Control Truths for Condos and HOAs
With Halloween right around the corner, in this episode of Take It To The Board, host Donna DiMaggio Berger and Dee Smith from NatureZone, a family-owned and operated pest control company, peek into the spookier corners of community association life: the creepy crawlies that make residents shiver and board members squirm. Together, they take a peek into what really moves through condos and HOAs: bed bugs that hitchhike on luggage, roof rats that turn trees into launch pads, and subterranean termites—now including a Formosan–Asian hybrid—capable of eating your equity faster than you’d ever expect.
You’ll learn how bed bugs actually spread in multifamily buildings, why foggers make them worse, and a simple hotel routine that uses a hairdryer and a bathtub to stop hitchhikers. Donna and Dee break down drywood termite myths, explain why subterranean baiting like Sentricon changes the game after heavy rains and floods, and map the entry points rats love most—soffit gaps where gables meet hips, open AC chases, and lush landscaping pressed against stucco. They also talk compassion and safety: handling hoarding cases without letting infestations jump through chases, relocating honeybees while decisively removing aggressive wasps, and using greener, microencapsulated products and inert dusts for residents with chemical sensitivities.
If you live in a condo, townhome, or HOA, this is your resident’s guide and board playbook in one. Expect field-tested tips, from shaving “boots” on cabbage palms and keeping bird feeders off structures, to recognizing termite pellets and swarmer wings before repairs get ruinous.
Conversation Highlights:
- The ultimate Halloween pest — which creepy crawler gives even the pros chills?
- The most common pests found in South Florida condominiums and HOAs
- Why pests spread so rapidly in multifamily buildings compared to single-family homes
- When a small issue becomes a nightmare: how one infested unit can impact an entire building
- The most unusual or memorable pest situations from real community cases
- Safe and eco-friendly pest control options for residents concerned about toxicity
- Tenting vs. spot treatment: how effective are different approaches for drywood and subterranean termites?
- Preventative policies boards can adopt—from hygiene to landscaping—to stop infestations before they start
- Plants and trees to avoid: what attracts rodents to community landscapes
- Dee's journey into pest control and what keeps her passionate about the field
- How modern pest control has evolved with greener, less toxic technologies
- Practical advice for boards developing or updating their community pest control plans
Related Links and Resources:
Hi everyone, I'm Attorney Donna DiMaggio Berger, and this is Take It to the Board, where we speak condo and HOA. With Halloween right around the corner, we're going to be peeking into the spookier corners of community association life today. I'm talking about the creepy crawlies that make residents shiver and board members squirm. Cockroaches, ants, silverfish, spiders, centipedes, millipedes, bedbugs, fleas, ticks, termites, dust mites, mosquitoes, lizards, geckos, wasps and hornets, drainflies, and finally rats and mice, maybe even some bats. In a multifamily building, if pest control isn't diligently undertaken, those little infestations can grow into full-blown nightmares for everyone. In an HOA with attached, semi-detached, or even single-family homes, ghostly termite trails and ghoulish rodent invasions can create huge problems for residents. In today's episode, we are going to separate fact from fright and help communities keep their homes safe from unwanted pests. My guest today is Dee Smith from NatureZone, a family-owned and operated pest control company. Dee started in the pest control industry 38 years ago and has handled all aspects of the process. Today, she remains active when it comes to solving pest issues for NatureZone clients, and she regularly tests new products to see if they can compare to the tried and true methods. There are aspects of this episode that do send chills down my spine, I'm going to be honest. So hopefully Dee can give me some comfort on what can be done to force those pests to move away from your home, sweet home. All right, let's get ready to face what's really lurking behind the walls in your home or condo unit. Dee, welcome to take it to the board. Thank you, Donna. Nice to talk to you. So in the intro, I ran through a pretty exhaustive list of creepy crawly pests we routinely hear about in homes and multifamily condo and co-op units. Did I miss any? Oh yes.
SPEAKER_01:We have frogs, we have raccoons, we have possums. I've actually pulled a duck out of a commercial building in the attic.
SPEAKER_02:You know, I had a duck in my fireplace one time. Something was crawled and it came down. Thank God I had one of those fireplace screens, but I had I happened to have work being done on the house at the time. So the contractor went in and, you know, once you let a well, I don't even need to tell you, once a wild animal's inside your house, it's chaos. So we're chasing it around trying to get it out. So I missed raccoons, you're right. And I missed possums and frogs. I have to tell you, frogs creep me out. I can deal with snakes, but frogs and rats are the ones that absolutely creep me out.
SPEAKER_01:Depending on, you know, depending on the species of the frog. You know, recently I've had two calls of frogs coming out of a toilet in a second floor unit, and they're saying, how do the frogs get up here? Well, there's lots of different ways the frogs get up there. Tell us how would a frog get into a second floor toilet? Well, a lot of times they'll either come up through the plumbing, through the stack, they'll come down through the stack and find their way up through a low toilet if the water's not being monitored in the unit and they can come up, same as cockroaches and rats, can come up through a dry toilet. But then the particular one that I just did a couple of weeks ago, I said, ah, it's not possible. It's you know on the roof, you know, but it's a uh the dryer vents because the state of Florida, the law says that they're not allowed to have the screens in the dryer vents because that's one of the number one hazards of fire. So they're required to remove them. And I said, Well, if frogs getting in there, they can't be getting into the dryer because the dryer vents attached to the wall. Well, I went and did my investigation, and sure enough, the pipe wasn't even attached to the wall, and the woman was wondering why she was having allergies so bad. There was lint dust two inches behind her dryer. So we found the problem. I haven't heard from her since.
SPEAKER_02:Let's get back to the frogs for a second. Is there in a multifamily building, we're talking about a stack of units? Right. Is it possible if somebody flushes something down, an animal, frog, a reptile, you name it, snake, it can pop up in another unit in that stack?
SPEAKER_01:It normally doesn't happen that way. Usually they're pretty dedicated. Your stacks are normally dedicated to the unit. Now, if you have multi, a lot of your multi-units will have a T box down at the bottom of the trap where they're going across. If you've got, let's say, I've got one is it, 16 units. They got the I call them T-boxes. There's another name for it, but you know, I'm just talking my terms. And they're just going to go down. The chances of them coming in a multifamily and going from one to another are slim to none. It hasn't happened. Absolutely. I was gonna say that at least is reassuring.
SPEAKER_02:So if you had to, you've seen it all, but is there any one pest that that kind of creeps you out, Dee?
SPEAKER_01:No, I can't really say many do anymore. I mean, bed bugs are the kind of grossest ones because they're just so hard to control. And, you know, and they're they're easily transferred around because they're just they're like the German road, they're they're the gift bug, you know. They they've actually have to be brought in. They don't fly, they're actually transferred in. They're the gift bug.
SPEAKER_02:So I know that's a big issue in a lot of hotel rooms. I know I've read about it in in cities like New York that had a huge bed bug problem in their hotel industry a few years back. Um, in a multifamily building, like a high-rise condo, let's say they get in there. First of all, you said they have to be brought in. So somebody brings in what a pillow from somewhere else that has that's infested?
SPEAKER_01:Anything you if you travel, you could go. I mean, back during the the day whenever they were very heavy here a few years back. I mean, we had we were had monitors in our libraries because people would take library books home and then bed bugs would get in their libraries. We had books going to a healthcare facility that the man never left, and it was an independent. He could come and go, but the man never left, yet he had bad bed bugs. Come to find out him and ironically, two months later, another uh resident were actually getting books from the same bookstore in New York City. That bookstore was shipping them bed bugs because I, for the life of us, we couldn't figure out how they were getting them. So that's one way to transfer bed bugs in a healthcare facility.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, I never would have even imagined that be you know, I'm a big fan of libraries and bookstores. So I never so they were in the books and then obviously spread in the unit.
SPEAKER_01:And so all of the books that were being brought back from whoever would, you know, check the books out, they had to be put into a quarantine before they could go back into the library. I mean, it was it was a big deal. So I mean, it's like an and I mean, I could tell you nightmare stories of bed bugs, and it's it's just crazy how they can actually travel throughout condominiums and and you know, uh multifamily living just through the walls. So let's talk about this.
SPEAKER_02:We're releasing this episode around Halloween. Let's hear, let's hear just how spooky bed bugs can get. First of all, how quickly do they spread? How do they spread? And how do you get rid of them? Okay.
SPEAKER_01:There's several ways to get rid of them. You know, there's a lot of people think that first off, they think it's a nasty thing. It's not a nasty thing. It's like German roaches, they're not a nasty thing. Bed bugs are brought in years ago, we had chemicals that we were allowed to treat with. And these days, you know, because of everybody being on the green, my and you know, our company is IPM, we start at the lowest threshold work up. Well, we don't have the chemicals to keep them under control anymore. That's the first problem. So whenever they get into a building, what happens is they usually they feed between 1 a.m. and 4 a.m. That's their normal feeding time. So if you're got insomnia, you're good to go, you're never going to get bitten. But they'll actually get on your pillow, they'll get in the folds of your sheets, you know, or your, you know, where the mattress comes along and they got that little bitty, little bitty where they sew it together. That's usually where you usually get them in the box springs. Nobody looks at the box springs. So you'll get an infestation in no time at all. Next thing you know, you've got an infestation and it can go on. And a lot of people are embarrassed. I mean, I have people going and buying, you know, picking up couches off the side of the road, or Aunt Lucy gave them a bed. It was full of bed bugs. And, you know, with the homeless population and everywhere, you know, they'll take anything and sleep on it. So it all just evolved. But you mentioned feed. What what do they feed on, Dee? Blood. Blood. They feed on people. They feed on human blood. You're their, you are their blood meal. The human is the blood meal. Do they feed on it on pets too? Dogs, cats? They do feed on pets, unfortunately. And it's kind of sad. I actually was in a situation a few years back that literally I went in and this woman had bed bugs so bad that her entire wall looked like somebody taking a shotgun and just shot, you know, just shot and spattered blood everywhere. And then I went next door. Whenever you have a bad infestation like that, and I felt bad for the dog. I didn't feel bad for the home owner because she knew better. She could have done something about it. I'm a I'm an animal lover, same as most people are. But so you feel bad for the animals, but then you feel bad for the neighbor because you have to do what's called the Hollywood squares. Anyone that's doing their due diligence to make sure you don't have bed bugs in a multi, you know, multi-condo, you know, multi-family situation. You have to do the if it's let's say you got multi-units around, you always do the Hollywood squares. Do three above, one on each side, and three below. This way you know because they will crawl through the walls. So they will travel, but but they can travel through concrete? They can travel through, all right. And most of your multi-family, um, y'all do construction law, don't you? Also, you do construction as well. So you know the the electrical wires, they're all run down one chase, so they're gonna split off. I don't care, you know, they're still gonna find themselves an electrical chase to go through or a plumbing chase, and they can travel that way. And one, they're not very big. I mean, they're literally, I mean, just like a the tip of a pen, and they're white. And so they go through all of their N-star stages. So they have to go through their exoskeleton where they shed their stage to get every time they get a blood meal, they go to their next stage, next stage. They have six six stages, I think it is 99% sure. So, what they do is once they've become to that stage, then they'll they land on you, they feed, and they get all filled up and they flop off. And that's how you find you can find them because the blood spots, it looks like ink stains on your pillow or on your sheets. And with the older population here and they travel a lot, going to Europe and other places, they brand them all. They don't know they have them. This particular case, I felt so bad because the one woman had them so bad in her place, they had literally gone through the wall into the other lady's place. I can't say their name. I could say it her name was Jones. I didn't say it last name. No names. But they went through the wall, and this poor woman had no clue, and she was getting eaten alive. Some people never even get bit by them. It's crazy. Some people never get bit by bed bugs, and some people get just totally annihilated by them. So we wound up having to pardon me do heat treatment in both of them units because they were so bad. And that means where you have to bring heating equipment in, they heat the room up, hold it to a certain temperature for several hours just to kill the bed bugs. And then you have to pull all the carpet out if there's any carpet. You got to get underneath the baseboards, take all the switch plate covers off, treat inside the walls. And I mean, it's a huge sounds more intense than termite treatment. Well, put it this way: it takes five times the fumigate to kill a bed bug as it does to kill a termite, and a termite is inside the wood.
SPEAKER_02:Wow. I am actually getting hives and feeling itchy as I'm listening to you describe bed bug infestation. I'm wondering if some of our listeners are going to as well. But so if I'm understanding you correctly, Dee, one, they're very, very tiny and white, but they are visible to the naked eye.
SPEAKER_01:That's their egg say, that's whenever their first end star. They look like a tick. They look like a tick. They're very visible. I mean, they're the size of uh Miss Gracious, they're about, but they're end of a pencil racer. Oh, that's okay. So that's very visible. Oh, yeah. And you, they're and they're fast. Them little rascals are fast. And all you need, and you have to tell the female has a rounded bottom and the male has a pointed bottom. So, I mean, if you want to take the time to identify them, I always keep scopes with me. I always keep two or three little microscopes and handheld scopes with me so I can identify in the field.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, I'm not sure I'd want to spend time identifying as opposed to just obliterating. But if I'm also hearing you, it would be very difficult for a homeowner to self-treat for once the bed bugs have taken hold for them to try to address this issue.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, yeah, they go to home, they go to the big box store and they buy the little bed bug bomb and they go in and they put the bed bug bomb off. And you know what they've done? What they do them, they push them rascals right into the walls. They push them deeper, deeper, and then you wind up getting a bigger issue. And it becomes very challenging. We're very successful at getting rid of them. We we actually Princeton actually has a section there called it's actually at Princeton, it's uh Bed Bug University. We sent one of our top um technicians to Bed Bug University for a week to learn about what to do and techniques during the big heyday of the bed bug situation. And we were doing liquid treatment over well, liquid and powder treatment over the heat treatment, and we were more successful. And that's exactly what they were doing at Princeton. So we just decided it works. Fortunately, fast forward 10 years, it's it's really reduced the the population of bed bugs has reduced probably 90%.
SPEAKER_02:So I was gonna ask you, you're dealing with Princeton. I'm wondering why they can't just do some sort of gene splicing like they've done with other pests, where you you know render the population sterile over time so it doesn't continue to they haven't figured that one out yet.
SPEAKER_01:That because there are so many and they come from all different countries. You know, they're worldwide. It is a worldwide pest.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, I was gonna ask you that, Dee. So right now, do you know which areas of the world have a uh a bigger bed bug problem right now?
SPEAKER_01:I do not. I I'd say Europe has always been the highest. Europe has always been a hot spot because they just they really don't think much about it. I mean, they just deal with it as part of it. However, um United States and I, you know, in Ohio, I'm not gonna say we're at in Ohio, but back in the day it was the bed bug capital of the United States. I was like, oh my goodness. So I I talk to people, I'd say, I know where you, I know what you got.
SPEAKER_02:Dee, I I travel quite a bit. I travel a lot to Europe. Actually, I have a trip planned, I think, in May. Should I be asking hotels what their bed bug policy is? I mean, how how concerned about this do we need to be?
SPEAKER_01:Nah, you know, I'd be really concerned. I I I actually have written articles on this. I've actually been, you know, a publisher. I teach classes on this, but it's really it's more of a a fear thing that people try to do. Something that I figured out, uh, because I have what's called a CSI kit that a company that I work with, uh young Sarasota, they actually developed it, which is for rinsing glasses and it's got everything, and I can find blood. I mean, I've actually gone to to um to Tallahassee to do the um Wednesday lobby day. And I was staying in a hotel downtown in Tallahassee. You never know what you're gonna find. So I got my CSI kit out, and I'm all excited. I'm looking for something. Couldn't find anything. I mean, I couldn't even find all I found was one little drop of urine in the toilet. I'm like, wow, this is a clean hotel. So I told them and they said, You want us to publish that? I said, No, you want to publish that.
SPEAKER_02:See, be honest. Have you ever broken out the CSI kit when you've been a house guest at a friend's? Only once.
SPEAKER_01:And I and I I I had to, and I'm getting to spend the night there. That's all I'm gonna say.
SPEAKER_02:Listen to I'm listening to your thinking, you could you make a great house guest.
SPEAKER_01:You get that kit out and start looking around. Every hotel has one thing. What is that? Every hotel usually has two things. One of them is what? Well, they normally have the they normally have the emergency exit back of the door. Oh, that's true. Next time you go to a hotel, all you got to do is pull your your covers back by your headboard, get that hair dryer, turn it on real hot, and run it around the headboard and around the top of the mattress. And if a lot, if a good hotel, they have mattress encasements on and they have bed bug encasements on, which protect you so bedbugs can't get out and they can't survive. So, but you take that hairdryer and bed bugs will move if there's anything on there. So that's your secret. And always put your luggage in the bathtub. Never put it on that on the bed or on that little fold-out thing until you've inspected the room.
SPEAKER_02:Oh my gosh, D, you have just I'm never gonna forget. So put the put the luggage in the bathtub.
SPEAKER_01:Why am I doing why am I putting my luggage in that tube? They can't climb in the bathtub. They can't climb out of the bathtub. They can't, they can't live in the bathtub, they can't climb out. So until you go do your inspection, you make sure you do that. And if you were on a long flight, take that hairdryer and also heat the bottom of your wheels on your luggage and make sure you had no hitchhikers and you're good to go. Wow.
SPEAKER_02:Okay. You've added to my to-do list when I travel, but okay, I do appreciate those are really, really useful tips. Okay, I'm gonna I'm gonna spread that. Um we've talked about bed bugs. I I will tell you, I have situations, you know, the title of the podcast is Take It to the Board. We have um an emphasis on community association lifestyle. I've had situations where quite a few over the years, where we have hoarders in units. And it's a mental health issue. We had an expert on a couple seasons ago talking about how to how to address a hoarding situation, how to clean out a unit. But until it gets to that point, and often it's people living alone. Um, and it's a sad situation overall. But again, I've seen it time and time again, where once it becomes known and you get in there, it's a really bad situation. And normally we're dealing with a a number of different pest infestations.
SPEAKER_01:Have you dealt with hoarding? Absolutely. I've been dealing with that for 35, 38 years since I got into this business in 1987. I dealt with my first one and back in the day, you know, back in the day, we could say, I'm not going in there. That's not healthy. It's not, it's not for my safety. And we could get, we can still kind of get away with some of it now. But being in what we do at Nature Zone, where our guys are all trained and we do all this stuff that we actually, technician has a problem going in a unit, they'll call me or they'll call upper management and we'll go in and we'll we'll work with them because it is, like you said, mental illness. And it's very, very scary and very dangerous for everybody because you get somebody that has a bad infestation, and and like you said, you never know what you got. American roaches, German roaches, rats, you know, anything. It is it's a health hazard more than anything.
SPEAKER_02:So and also it's a hazard for your employees because sometimes, as I said, the same person who's hoarding feels very connected emotionally to the mass, to everything, to the even the food that's rotting on the counters. And you don't know if that person is potentially armed and dangerous. So we've had to go, listen, that's where you get your lawyer involved, and that's where we get a, you know, that's where we get an injunction. And again, it's a it's a real balancing act because it's sad and you are dealing with um normally with a very vulnerable person, but it it helps if you've got emergency contact information for all your owners, and that way you can kind of get family involved and see if they can be part of the solution. From your perspective, have you ever had that go into a unit in like a hazmat suit?
SPEAKER_01:Oh gosh, yes. Oh, heck yeah. I've gone and I I've suited up. I mean, and and with a full respirator and everything. Because whenever you're going in and there's maggots and there's cockroaches and there's just everything. That particular one, there was no rats, believe it or not. Um, you know, and but there was so much just decaying food. And I just told him, I said, I can't go in there. I mean, I literally just put on Tyvek and respirator and gloves and went in, and all you could do is do a knockdown. That particular patient was actually you know institutionalized because they they had they could not live on their own anymore. And then you have to get the people in to come in and clean it up. And then that's that's where you find people that are in the in the business. That's what they do. So it becomes very expensive and costly for the association.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, like my pri my my prior guess, we we actually had to take a unit down to the studs for that reason. All the flooring up, all the wall coverings, all the everything, down to the white cement box because of this the hoarding situation. I would imagine from what you're telling me, a lot of these animals, a lot of these pests will feed on human flesh. So it's incompatible with human life to be living in a unit or a home with that, you know, coexisting with that level of pest infestation.
SPEAKER_01:Well, I think it was back in the I want to say the 80s in New York. New York, here we go, New York, poor New Yorkers, poor New Yorkers. But there was this family, and they had these little kids, and the kids had no eyebrows and no eyelashes, and they couldn't, they were trying to figure out, they thought the parents were abusing them. So they brought the you know, the health health people in, you know, the HR, whatever they're called, child, you know, child protective services in. Kind of find out they had such an infestation of roaches. The roaches were literally eating these little kids' eyebrows and eyelashes and eating their, they actually will eat your skin tissue. They had so many, just nibbling on these poor kids when they were sleeping at nighttime. I mean, this is it's real fun.
SPEAKER_02:I'm so glad I had you on for our Halloween episode, you really are delivering, I have to say. Um, let's let's change gears into because we've been talking a lot about infestation in vertical construction in multifamily buildings, where it is you're on top of each other, and what your neighbor does, as we've just been discussing, very much influences and impacts your unit and your home and your family. Let's talk about homeowners associations. I live in an HOA, I have a single family home. I do remember I had a neighbor who was treated, I think, twice for termites, and eventually I got them too. So that's what happens, right? Drywood termites, they fly.
SPEAKER_01:Well, that's a fallacy sometimes. I mean, okay. Yeah, I have a saying. You got the houses that have termites and the houses that are gonna have them. There's there's never a house in that's not gonna get them one time in your life, you're gonna get it in a piece of furniture. Back at the turn of the last big recession, when was that 2007 or eight? A whole bat, a batch of high-end furniture grade wood got brought, you know, furniture grade plywood got brought into, you know, in the States and it wasn't properly treated. Well, then fast forward a few years later, we have a pandemic. So then a lot of that wood, some cabinet still set around, you know. So what happened is it takes four to six years before you even know you have a termite, drywood termite. They've already been in the wood for four to six years. I mean, I have structures that are 100 years old and never get a termite on. But then I have a structure that's, you know, five years old and it's ate up, and it's just because of the wood. Our wood is not treated and it's not, it's actually not grown the way it used to be. So whenever you have your neighbor's house that had to be treated, they might have had a situation. It doesn't mean that termites left there and went to your house. Drywood termite colonies are very small. If you take an eight by ten piece of paper, a drywood termite colony is usually 30 to 300. They're not the ones that really scare me. They're not gonna it takes 20, proof in fact, 20 plus years to be in a structure before they cause structural damage. So, you know, you have time. Usually when you see the little pellets that look like coffee grounds, that's your warning sign. I better call somebody. When you see, or when you see the wings in the windows, and you that means they're swarmers, that means when they're swarming, they've been there four to six years. It is time for them to fly out, find them a mate. They have this big old party, as I call it a big old orgy. They gotta hook up, find someplace to get into within 24 hours and start their new colony. And that new colony, it's gonna take four to six years before you even know if you have them either, you know, in that area. So, but the the survival rate is very small. So, so when just because you got them at your house, it was just your luck of the jaw. Nine nine nine out of ten, they're either gonna come in through plot through furniture being brought in, through, through um white wood, you know, white wood, which is softwood. They love that. They usually fly in through a soffit because they come in through an attic and then they get their way in. But it doesn't always mean you have to have fumigation.
SPEAKER_02:Is it true, Dee, that you shouldn't leave wood piled up around your house? Or I remember actually, I think my neighbor had an untreated wooden shed, like a wooden fence. Right. Um, is it true that you should be mindful of the type of wood products you have sitting around your house?
SPEAKER_01:Oh, absolutely. You should always keep you know, it should be pressure treated. B, it should nothing should ever be touching your house.
unknown:Okay.
SPEAKER_01:And you know, I have a single, if it's green and touching your house, you need to get it off of your house. And then you should never stack wood because the wood stacked, not only can it cause subterranean termites, which is underground termites, them are a different rascal all in themselves, which I'd like to talk about that one if we could. But they also cause cockroaches, ants, crickets, you name it. If it's wet there and it's getting rained on, anything can can live in that wood. Snakes, spiders, widows, you know, they're they're all there. That's a haven for them. So you want to keep everything away from your house.
SPEAKER_02:So let's talk. And you're saying this to somebody who loves her climbing vine that's so pretty on my pork cashier. But yes, it's green and it's all touching my my succo. It's mixed beautiful.
SPEAKER_01:You can have your vine if you do, if you do proactive treatments around the outside, there's so many great chemicals out there. And our chemicals today are a hundred times better than what we had 30 years ago. I mean, our chemicals today, I mean, we use repellents, we use natural products that you can use yourself to treat treat at the base of your vine. You know, if you've got just a regular ivy vine that's growing up, and if it doesn't have flowers on it, you don't have to worry about bees. But if it has flowers, you just have to worry, you're gonna have ants because the ants are gonna go. Ants protect the aphids, the aphids, it's just all it's all the food chain how they do it. Well, you mentioned better products. Do you mean less toxic, more effective, or both? Both. It's more effective. Our products today are so much more effective than what we had 30 years ago. I mean, and you know, the the the people that are testing it, they're spending millions and millions of dollars because every, you know, it's no different. You know, everybody wants to be the top dog in town. And where we had back in the day, I was using diazinine and Durasban, and heck, my grandpa was in this business in the 50s and 60s here, and he was using chloridane, DDT, so it's all gone down, you know, down the city. Those sound very dangerous, D. Well, you know what made them dangerous? They became available to John Q Public. If John Q Public had not been able to get his hands on a lot of these products, we'd probably still have access to some of them today. But what happens is Malathine is a product you can buy. It's a great product. It's actually, believe it or not, it stinks to high heaven. But the label says one tablespoon per gallon. Well, my daddy rests his soul. He said, Ah, I'm gonna put three tablespoons in that and I'm gonna kill every damn ant in the house. And I said, Yeah, you ain't gonna have no neighbors either. And he did not have any ants. But that's what happens. Says one tablespoon per gallon, you use one tablespoon per gallon. People just abused it. Now, our products today, oh my gosh, we've got um uh eco granulars, we've got a centra G, we've got IC, you know, we've got all of these products that are just so the LD50, you know, lethal dose 50 is is just awesome. You don't have to worry about hurting people or hurting, you know, the environment and properly apply it. I mean, IPM integrated pest management, which is you know what we practice, always start at your lowest threshold and work your way up. And I mean, the products are made to last longer. I mean, we can spray something now and it's got a microencapsulated product can last for five to seven months in the proper application.
SPEAKER_02:Well, you gone into a topic that really I wanted to dig into because in a lot of our communities, we've got people who are sensitive to chemicals and they say, I don't want any pest control inside my unit or inside my home. Let's say it's an attached townhome situation. Um, and that does become a problem because it becomes a problem if that unit or that home is not treated and they're not properly treating their potential pest infestation, it's going to spread. But on the other hand, if the association ignores that and says we're treating anyhow, they leave themselves open to a claim that the person has become ill as a result of the association's pest control services. I've dealt with that a lot. So if I'm hearing you correctly, do you have specific green products that you can say this is tested, we can use this in your instance for a very sensitive owner?
SPEAKER_01:Absolutely. And also, if you also are on the do not spray, you got to pay 15. I think it's still$15 a year. And it's state of Florida. I mean, you if you actually truly are sensitive, you're supposed to register, pay the$15, and you're once you're registered, obviously you know this, you pay the$15, you're registered. Every pest control company that does business in that area is supposed to be notified. And then if I go apply a pesticide, um, we had a lady here in Sarasota, she's long past, but I talk about her in my class that I that I've written and taught. And she has been a thorn on everybody's side for years. But what happens is if I if I don't abide by that law, that is a law that there that I am not allowed to spray any pesticide within so many feet of this person, then I can, you know, we can get fined. But but we also use monitors. We use Simexa, which is pharmaceutical grade silica gel. That's how we actually discovered that we can fight termites and bed bugs with that. And it's just a natural desiccant. Take off a switch plate, put that in a wall. I recently had a situation where a woman is swearing that jail baits, GEL baits, are causing her problems. It's impossible. It's impossible for it to happen, but it's her psychological thought plan that says this is I'm allergic to this, so we can't even go in there and use a gel bait. There, we did a bunch of monitors, which are little glue boards. We put them out, we put the date on them, we go back in a few days and see if we have anything. And 99% of the time, it's really nothing there, but but we still have to go there. And in our business, if uh if someone says they have a roach problem, and we use it actually every day in regular pest control, where I actually put a glue board out, and if I see a cockroach is facing one direction and they're different ages, I know that I've got a population, I've got a mixed population within 10 to 30 feet. So I go that direction and find out where they're at. You know, there is a science to it. And so once I find out where they're at.
SPEAKER_02:I'm learning that, Dee, from listening to you, I'm learning that it's more than just a random, you know, palmetto bug scrawling, you know, crawling across the floor. It's an indicator of, like you said, a population. But as a lay person, we wouldn't know that.
SPEAKER_01:Right. And that's and that's why I love what I do. I haven't been to work in years and years. I just have too much fun because I mean they're doing DNA testing on insects now. We're finding, I mean, we got these termites that are they're doing DNA testing, ants. I mean, it's just so exciting. And we're learning more about the the all of the insect population. And it's just this the University of Florida IFUS. I mean, they're awesome. I mean, they're they're a great hub of information. And but the to know that they're we're developing chemicals that are very low in any toxicity, but they know that they like this flavor. It's like ants, you know, ants' DNA. I was told this, and I'm I'm I probably shouldn't repeat it, but it's not if I haven't truly 100% proven it, but I was told this by an ant guru that an ant's DNA is like 65% of a human being. And but if you think of their habits and their patterns, they actually do just like us in the wintertime. What do I want? I want carbohydrates, I want beef stew, I want, I want comfort food. And in the summertime, I just want to grab a potato chip or have some candy bar and go on my merry way. And ants actually eat that way. So the baits are actually developed and made for their appetite. Except, well, Optigard is uh an ant bait that they came out with that had the carbohydrate, the protein, and the sweet all in one. And it just it's awesome. It's a great ant bait.
SPEAKER_02:So I'm still trying to let the concept of an ant guru sink in. I love the passion you have for what you do because uh it's it's obvious that you love what you do, and you're right, you don't you're not working when you're doing what you love. The uh so that gets me into another interesting question, which is should we be killing these ants, these insects? I mean, is it is it something where we'll ever get to a point where we can just coex not the bed bugs, because they're actually feeding on us, but ants who aren't really doing insects that aren't doing structural damage or damage to us as humans. Should we try to coexist? I'm thinking of any Buddhists out there who are going to listen to this episode and and you know, say maybe we shouldn't be killing things. What do you think?
SPEAKER_01:We have to control the population. The same as the human population evolves, the insect world and the pest world has to evolve the way because otherwise they would take over. You have to understand. We reproduce one nine months, nine and a half months. They reproduced thousands in you know, in a in a week, or you know, a week or 30 days or 90 days. So you have to think about the different populations. So if you don't control that population, do you have if if but if we destroyed every insect on the face of the earth, we um years ago there was a test done on an island, they annihilated everything on this island, everything was gone. I mean, they I don't know what the heck they put down, but it was like Maypal man, they just killed everything. Two weeks later, guess what came up out of the ground? What? Cockroaches. Cockroaches The cockroaches have been on the earth for over 250 billion years. I mean, that's the one that grosses me out. Cockroach grosses me out, has always ever since I've been a little kid. They're just nasty. And what I don't even know what I don't even know what purpose they have on the earth is other than to get squished.
SPEAKER_02:But listen, D, just so you know, I have no problem being a soldier in the army to control insects. I'm there. I mean, I I I don't have a problem controlling the population because I agree with you. They also cockroaches gross me out, especially the big ones that fly around.
SPEAKER_01:Right. And and and that's the that's your American cockroach. And then you know everybody calls them palmetto bugs in Florida, and you know how that came about. I do not, but is it to do with the palmetto plant? No, it actually, well, we call them palm meter trees, but the palmetto bug, they what happened in the 60s, you know, down here in beautiful Florida. Everybody wanted to come down here, and but in the you know, in the 60s to have a cockroach was nasty. Oh, you're nasty. We don't want to stay at that place, they're nasty. Well, hello, it was the woods back then. Well, some genius person said, Oh, honey, they're not cockroaches, they're palmetto bugs, and it stuck. Marketing. You're talking about marketing. And the palmetto bug actually is it's like a it's actually it doesn't fly, it doesn't have developed wings, and it's broad, and when you step on it, it stinks to high heaven. But and it's just basically it lives in the palmetto palmetto trees and not in the palmetto scrub. So they really don't, you know, they live in rodent bait stations, but um, most people have never seen one. The roaches that y'all see are which what we probably shouldn't tell this, but they're actually American cockroaches or Oriental cockroaches, and they fly and they'll get in your hair and they drive you crazy and beat the hell out of your head trying to get them out of your hair.
SPEAKER_02:But but I've never had now you're raising new levels of nightmares. No, uh they get in people's hair. I've never seen that.
SPEAKER_01:Open your door if you're if your light is on at nighttime and it's a hot, steamy night, and you got trees around your house. Don't be surprised if you have a cockroach fly in your house. They fly by like a 4747, and then you're like, where'd that roach come from? And if you have a cat, you're lucky because cats always love chasing them down and killing them. I have a cat. I have a cat named Talia, and indeed she does. She brings you prizes, so you see, you don't have to worry about it. But that's that's pest control 101. Your cats aren't in her keep.
SPEAKER_02:Well, well, let me talk to you about the plant material because I want to remember now we're still in the homeowners association, and I do want to talk about subterranean termites in a second. But first, let's talk about the plant material. So there's different types of trees. There's the royal palm, but then there's those other little trees that I was told palms that really are attractive to rats. So it would be important, right, for a homeowners association to maybe create some guardrails around the plant material that's installed, because some is going to be more attractive to rats and other pests, correct?
SPEAKER_01:Well, the palm palmetto trees or the I guess I call them to call them cabbage, no, it's called cabbage palms or palmettoes. They're the ones that had the boots on them. And in them boots, if they don't shave the boots, that's where cockroaches live and rats live. I mean, I've I've seen tons and tons of rats. I had a yeah, I had a community down in Venice. The they didn't ever want any rodent control until they started cutting their cabbage palms. And the president called me and said, You need to get over here now. I just counted 30 rats flying out of a cabbage tree whenever they were trimming it. So they cut all their cabbage palms away from their building. But you have to understand a rat can jump. They can jump down eight feet, they can jump up two or three feet. So, so they don't really, you know, they can, if they can get out there on it, they can sail across and they're on your building. Oh my god.
SPEAKER_02:Oh my gosh. What about what about uh communities they have a lot of bodies of water, lakes and canals, right? Also attract rats and mice.
SPEAKER_01:They attract rats. They they attract rats. We have three rats in this area of Florida. We don't have like Central Florida where we are in Sarasota Tampa Market, you know, down south, you know, you know, Fort Myers. We don't have like three species of rats. We have the roof rat, we have the house mouse, and we have the field mouse. We don't have the Norway rat, we don't have all them big things that they have in New York that, you know, you carry two cups to go on with back up because they're so big. And the rat was the largest, and the ratus ratus, which is your roof rat, it also has it's also known as the black rat, the sewer rat, the tree rat, the fruit rat. It's all one rat.
SPEAKER_02:What about the pizza rat in New York City? Did you ever see the pizza rat? I'm joking. Did you ever see the name about the pizza rat and the subway?
SPEAKER_01:No, I didn't, but I've seen cop go in with his gun pulled whenever there was one in the subway.
SPEAKER_02:Look up after this episode, look up Pizza Rat New York. It's a rat that made a big splash in New York City, tried riding around with a with a piece of pizza in its mouth.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, ratatouli. Then they're doing ratatouli, right? Anyway, so so back to the rat before I go down a rabbit hole. The rat, she gets she starts breeding at three months of age, the roof rat. So the gestation is 22 days.
unknown:Oh my god.
SPEAKER_01:So in 22 days, she can have six to twelve pups. Two days after she has pups, she can get pregnant again. So an adult breeding pair of roof rats can have an offspring of about 1,500 in a year. So whenever you have that kind of population, everybody says, Oh, I've got mice. You don't have mice, baby, you got baby rats, is what you have. And so whenever we're when you're trapping them, I say to our guys, and I know it's you know, I'm a farm girl. I'm raised on a 240-acre working farm. So I'm a farm girl, Lord only knows what's gonna come out of my mouth. I said, Did you sex it? And they're like, What, Dee? And I'm like, Did you see if it's goddamn any male junk or female junk? How do I know? And I'm like, oh my gosh, just if it's a female, she's gonna have teets. Just if she has teats and she's fat, start, you know, if she does it, you know, look for pups because you're gonna have, you know, you're gonna be looking for babies. If it's a male, sorry for your luck, pal.
SPEAKER_02:Wait, wait, wait, Dee. How is somebody supposed to? Now I'm a city girl. I I was born in Chicago. Am I supposed to grab them the rat and turn it over and look?
SPEAKER_01:Well, whenever we whenever we've trapped them or if they're dead, we pick them up, you pick them up with a glove and you look at them and you see if they got, you know, six big old boar rats in my life. I see I see you have skills I will never have, but okay, I'm good. Please tell us more. Right. So, and it's important because if it's a male, sorry for your luck, pal, you're not going to be reproducing anymore. But if it's a female, we need to find, we need, hey, she's dead. So now we need to start looking for her pups because you know, it's just no different than, you know, everything nurses, dogs nurse, cats nurse. So you got to start looking. And and and some of our guys, you know, just go, I ain't looking at that crap, you know. But I'm trying to, I'm trying to train them to where they do it because it makes our job easier. And I I know if it's a boy, sorry, but leave a rat trap out, leave a glue board out to monitor to make sure that the the coast is clear. There's nothing worse than a population of rats that have taken over, and them rascals are trouble.
SPEAKER_02:I'm I'm already having chills down my spine, but okay, we live in a in a home. We're on a, let's say we're on a canal or a lake. What do we do to make our to to rat proof our house?
SPEAKER_01:First off, you need to go around your house, and there's like simple areas, the biggest 99% of the time. I have to laugh because I can go with my eyes closed. I've been doing it, but I like building things too. That's a hobby. But where a house where the pitch of you look at a gable or you'll have a pitch of a front of a house, well, then you'll have that hip roof that comes down. I call it where the gable and the hip come together, where the soffit is. 99% of the time, if you have a rat problem, look up there because they were too deadgum lazy to put the soffit all the way up in that little corner because they just ran out of soffit that day, and nobody's gonna know. That's why when you start hearing things in your attic, they've that's where they got in. Or you go over where your air conditioning chase is, where your air conditioning, where that little cake, that cover they put over your outside of your air conditioning, it's always open. Well, guess what? That goes straight up into your attic, into your your water lines, into your electrical. Once they're up in there, boom. So you always check your soffit, you check your AC chase, you look around your house for any holes. I mean, rats dig, rats can burrow, and that will go up into a little hole under something. So you have to be careful, especially if you live in a house that's on a crawl space. Crawl space, that's another story in itself. That's always fun.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. Well, tell me, what are you gonna find in a crawl space, D? Huh.
SPEAKER_01:I have a coworker that won't even go under a crawl space. I'm under there and I'm like, dude, get out here and help me. Because his eyes are all big, uh-uh, D, I'm not going over there. I'm like, dude, get under here, and he's like, hell no. And I'm like, okay, fine. He just will not go under a crawl space because he's terrified. Like, there's roaches, there's rats, there's snakes, there's spiders. And the secret, people have asked me for years and years and years, Dee, how do you do it? How do you go in attics? You know, because I've been in attics where there's this million million million cockroaches on the wall, and all of a sudden I hear the I'm like, ah, crap, get out of there. But the secret to going under a crawl space and then an attic is you don't think about what's there. Because if you think about what's there, you're not gonna go. I'll be in addicts tomorrow morning.
SPEAKER_02:Just do it is your is your slogan, like Nike.
SPEAKER_01:You just do it and you don't think about it. Because if you think about it, I've I've been face to face with a mad old mama raccoon and three pups and a three kids in an attic. That is not fun. I have backed out very slowly. Step away from the raccoon because she will tear you up.
SPEAKER_02:I think I have a critter who comes on my patio because it knocks over. I have, you know, uh my whole patio is open and we live on a golf course. And I have, you know, vases, orchids, and it keeps knocking over this one orchid. So on top of a table. So I think I have a critter that's hopping up there for I don't leave any food out. I know that's that's a bad thing, but I'm thinking I have a raccoon or put a little camera out.
SPEAKER_01:They got these cute little cameras. They're they're called W-I-Z-E. They're so cute. You can literally, it's all it and you we we use men addicts when we're trying to find out what's in an attic sometime, because sometimes we can't find the pro the creature. So we'll put these little cameras in there and it's all hooked up to Wi-Fi, and we actually can it'll we'll get a trigger if it sets the camera off, and we can actually find out what it is what we're dealing with. And that's fun. It's kind of like a game camera, but they're just really nice and they're all Wi-Fi, and you know.
SPEAKER_02:I can see how that would be fun for you and not so fun for me. Let me ask you, I've always won by the way, I've always wanted to install a bird feeder, and I know in a lot of our communities they have a community bird feeder. To me, though, I've always been afraid that I'm gonna look out there and see some fat rat in my bird feeder. Is that a legitimate concern?
SPEAKER_01:Absolutely, 100% you will. Oh, okay, no bird feeder. Well, my sister has one, but she has it on the other side of her fence. She's in an HOA, but she has it on the outside of her fence on a on the community property near the canal. And I've looked at there many times. I see a big old fat rat, and I just want to go pop it. But you know, but she has a big old fat rat that'll go by and then the cat goes and cat chases it, so whatever. But yeah, they are nothing, and especially in healthcare, like you know, in the hospice houses, people that's what they want to look at, but then they wonder why they have. I don't know why we have rats, and it's because they bless our hearts, you know, people in healthcare, they're lonely. They want to look out the window and see the pretty bird, right? But you've got so you've got to choose your battles, you know, choose your battles and choose them wisely. Some of my people put out, I hate to say it, they put out rodent bait stations out by their house, so the rat will go and eat that, and you keep the rat population down, and you still get to enjoy your bird feeders. Okay, that's one option.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, I know you like to give options. What about bees? Do you so in some some of our homes we've got, you know, hornets' nests, wasps, and bees.
SPEAKER_01:Do you also deal with those kind of uh all the time, all the time deal with them? I personally will tell you right now, unless you show me an epi pen and a letter from a doctor that says you're allergic to bees, I'm not gonna kill a bee. A wasp, they will, yes, I'll kill a wasp. A honey bee, I will not kill it. I refuse to. We have a beekeeper's that we recommend that we work with very closely. They go in and they take care of it.
SPEAKER_02:If it's I'm happy to hear that. And and my experience is because I have a lot of flowers at the house, they don't really disturb you, the bees.
SPEAKER_01:They're not bothering anything, they're not bothering you. Even the even the wasps. I mean, if a wasp is not bothering me or bothering, why should I kill it? But if it's a nuisance, then you know, you're walking along and you get binged on, yeah. Sorry, dude, you gotta go. But everything is a pollinator. I mean, heck, if it flies and and moves, it's a pollinator. But technically, the the wasps, you know, they are dangerous. That's my next thing that I'm working on is a bite as you know, bees and stinging insects, because there is a health um issue with it, you know, and people are allergic, you know. I'm personally allergic to yellow jackets, you know, but am I gonna kill everyone I see? Well, probably, but you know, not unless it's bothering. If it's bothering me, I'm gonna kill it. But and I mean, I we got one, I got it real quick. We got one of the largest populations of yellow jackets ever found in this area by Ringland College, Ringland School of Art, years ago. It was the size probably six foot. It was six foot, and it was a yellow jacket nest in the ground under his eye trees by an oak tree.
SPEAKER_02:And it was a six-foot nest.
SPEAKER_01:It was a six-foot nest, it was yellow jackets, and one of the maintenance guys, he had his little raggedy truck that he was driving, and the it was rattling. Well, he was sitting there, I don't know what he was doing. He was probably looking at his schedule. What he was supposed to do is early in the morning, and all of a sudden the truck was rattling. It agitated the yellow jackets. They flew into the truck, still his dad 127 times. They called me out. I was in Tampa, they called me. I came down and I'm standing there and I got banged a couple of times. I'm like, oh heck no, this is too big for even me. So we brought somebody else in, and literally, they said it was the largest one they had ever found in the area. I mean, it was massive. So I mean, it's just goes to show you that they they get under bushes and under trees. And if you see them coming out of the ground, use caution because yellow jackets are probably one of the most aggressive, they're even more aggressive than hornets, in my opinion. And they are nasty creatures and they will sting multiple times.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, I mean, I think you need to stay on top of it. By the way, I hope your colleague survived that attack.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, he did, he did. He had to go to the hospital. He was in the hospital for two days. Oh boy. But it was just, but it's it's it's a serious situation. And you know, honey bees are just honey bees can be just as aggressive if you if you bother them. But if you don't bother honey bees, you call a specialist, they're gonna come in, they're gonna relocate them. Relocate them, yeah. And and I, you know, unless you should I'm many times I've had someone say, Oh, I'm allergic. And I'm like, and I know it sounds cold and callous, but after you've been doing this for a hundred years, how many times were you stung before you found out you were allergic? Oh, I've never been stung. My doctor just said I was allergic. I'm like, then you're just go away. Because you know, everybody's allergic. Everybody's allergic to fire, and you get stung by fire in it, you're gonna get a little blister, you know.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, I mean, I think there's a toxin, so you will have an inflammatory response. But listen, there are people who are deathly uh allergic to to stinging insects, and I assume they know that. That's why they carry the EpiPen with them.
SPEAKER_01:And when it comes to life safety, there is no excuse. There's no, there's no, there, there's you got to go there. If someone tells me this is a matter of life safety deed, I'm gone. I'm I'm on it. I'm gonna go kill whatever I have to kill because that's part of it. Yeah. But I'm not just going to just go kill something just because you're telling me, you know, I'll go stew it away. You know, I'm not killing everything.
SPEAKER_02:I understand that, and I appreciate that. I I did want to give you an opportunity to talk about those subterranean termites because they are different than drywood, correct?
SPEAKER_01:Oh, oh yeah. We've got a new, we've got a new hybrid termite, folks, and it's down there by your area, actually. It's um the foremost of subterranean termite, which worked her way up into this area of Florida, up in actually all the way up to Tampa. It's huge bat bad problem in Tampa. It's a big termite that actually is brown and it looks like a drywood termite and has been misdiagnosed and and misidentified as a drywood termite. Well, we finally figured out that they finally figured it out. I spent three years looking for one down here to get my name on it, but I never found it. So I didn't get that. But anyway, but this is foremost. You said the foremost. But then the Asian subterrenian termite came into the picture. Well, back in 2021, I'm actually doing a talk on this Friday. Then 2021, they discovered the University of Florida that they were seeing a similarity of swarmers, which is whenever they come and they swarm and they're ready to go find their mates. They captured some and found out because the University of Florida is always doing DNA testing on stuff. They literally did a test and found out that the Asian subterranean termite and the Formosan subterranean termite are actually breeding and have developed a hybrid termite. And they haven't named it yet. So this is huge because they're really big time in Fort Lauderdale area, Fort Myers, and working their way up to this part of Florida. So this is something that we're really watching closely because we're talking the Eastern Subterranean tarmite, the little black ones, they're destructive as heck. Then them little rascals, they'll tear crap up. These guys, I mean the same piece of paper I told you about with the dry woods 30 to 300. You're talking 300,000 to 3 million in that same 8x10 piece of paper. So we're talking eating machines that look at the earth. What do they eat, so what and dry wood, it's clear they eat wood. What do what do the subs eat? Subterraneans eat wood, but they eat massive amounts of it. They go up, it takes a 30 second of an inch of credit card thickness for them to get in. Now, you know, a few years back you heard about the supercon super termite that was eating the concrete. They weren't eating concrete. They don't eat concrete. That's that's the news media for you. They actually, if it's soft or if it's damaged, they can go through stuff, but they're and they love cellulose, they love wood, they love they don't care. They're actually finding them rascals are getting in in pressure treated wood. We're talking something that I'm I'm a huge fan, if I may say Centricon is something that we are, you know, one of the nine representatives south of the skyway. I am a huge fan of that because it does, and there are other products out there that are baits that will kill subterranean termites. But you must bait these guys and and kill them. You can use trench and drench methods where you dig around a structure and dump thousands of gallons of of chemicals, which I'm not a fan of, but if you have to, you do what you have to do to kill them. But it is important to have something protecting your structure after all the hurricanes last year. We don't have anything protecting. There was so much water that just stood for days and days that that washed away any any protection you had in the ground around your structure, around your condos, around your homes. It's basically gone. That's a really good point, Dee.
SPEAKER_02:So let me ask you, are you working with any developers? Are you finding developers that from inception are creating these kind of barriers to prevent a subterranean infestation?
SPEAKER_01:They're still doing the slab treat. You know, it's been since the beginning of time, since construction that I can remember. So I've been doing this. Um, they slab treat, you know, you have to you treat the slab, you put up thousands of chemical, thousands of gallons of chemicals on top of the dirt, then you cover it up with plastic, and then you put the concrete on top of it. Now, because all because of the green, you know, we are green, you know. I do a lot with a lot of green prop green hotels and green, you know, green companies that we actually can put the centricon in after the final grade. Centricon is going to because the recruit bait is what the termites are attracted to. Back to we're talking about the standing water where nothing was there. We had somebody talking about saying, oh, well, it affects Centricon too, you know. Well, actually, Dow AgriScience did a test, and I have the facts to prove it, that for seven years they tested it in salt water because salt water intrusion is what people were saying was breaking down everything. The Dagum termites love the salt water soaked bait more than they love the regular bait. So it actually was a benefit. So all of the homes that had the centricon in place are still protected. So it's still so it still was effective. It was still effective. It's still effective. Up where I live, I live up above Tampa in a little town by called Bushnell. We have sandy clay, and it ain't nothing but subterranean termite heaven up there. I mean, in two months' time, I did a test and a board was just annihilated with subterranean termites. I put Centricon in, bam, gone. So I just I do tests up there on my own property because I can. But and it's fun to see what I can kill up there. Um that's another door, another story. But so you have to protect your my my only tell saying for anybody that owns a condominium, a home or anything, a mobile home, whatever, protect your investment because it's your largest investment. And if you don't protect it, you're gonna regret it because it is very costly to go and and and fix your property if you know if you get ate up by termites. That's your that's the biggest problem.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, I've got people that had to move out. I've known people that had to sell because of subterranean termites, right? And they and they sold it was a fire sale for all intents and purposes because they just could not get rid of them. So you're you're you're absolutely right. It's it's great advice. I I want to wrap up because you've been so generous with your time. You said you were a farm girl. Is that how you got excited about? I mean, is that how you got involved with pest control and made this your life work?
SPEAKER_01:Or how did you get into this industry, Dee? No, my grandpa was in the business, like I said, in the 50s and 60s, and my grandpa, my pop, my dad. But then I did, I went, I was in another comp another business for years before I got into this. But then I just I was bored one day and I said, I want to do something different. So I did this, and and then I I got out of it, but I kept my all my all my certifications up, and then I got back in it 18 years ago at Nature's Zone and and never looked back. I've just been having too much fun. But when I started until, and I guess all one of these days I might hang up my hat, but not until I get bored. If it's not fun, I don't want to do it.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, I I think that's great life advice across the board. You did tell me before we started taping that you had a nickname. What's the nickname? Oh, the rat lady. The rat Karen. Is it is it because do the rats like have a picture of you with like a red slash through it?
SPEAKER_01:They never well on my business, on my business card, it took me 17 years to let the boss let me do it. It says your local hired killer. And my tagline is I'm D When H is on your local hired killer. You just have to have more than two legs though.
SPEAKER_02:Well, you know, we're only capturing the audio in in this podcast, but I will tell our guests, D is a lovely, lovely looking lady. So I I mean, I don't think the hired killer that that does her justice. So D, last question, where can people find you?
SPEAKER_01:They can find me at D-E-E.smith at nature zone, n a t-u-r-z-o-n-e.com. There's no neat no e after nature.
SPEAKER_02:That that one almost tripped me up when I first when I was first emailing you. Dean, thank you so much for joining us. And uh yeah, hopefully we won't get too many chills or or or people getting the the itchies listening to some some portions of this podcast episode.
SPEAKER_01:Well, thank you so much for the invite. And I could tell I could tell fun stories all day long if y'all ever want some good one put in.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, I think we'll have you back. Maybe we'll make it an annual Halloween uh ritual. Dee, thanks again. Thank you. Thank you, Donna. Thank you for joining us today. Don't forget to follow and rate us on your favorite podcast platform or visit take it to the board.com for more ways to connect.