Common Pests in Maple Grove 

Mice

Ants

Wasps

Spiders

Boxelder Bugs

Stink Bugs

To protect your home from Insects join our Insect Protection Plan (IPP) 

If you have questions, concerns, or want to schedule an appointment

Call Us Today! 952-404-BOGO (2646)

Mice live in groups of multiple females, their young, and one or two males. When living together, they are focused on two jobs to stay alive: breed and hoard food. Mice do not hibernate in the winter and do not have a breeding season. Each mouse can breed 1-10 times a year, and each litter can have 2-10 pups. Over time, a mouse problem inside a home can get out of hand quickly.

Our mouse service is BOGO’s signature service that we provide. Our service starts with a thorough inspection of the property. During the inspection, our techs took pictures of entry points and evidence of mice on the exterior of the home. They then explain the severity of the mouse problem. Whether it’s a simple fix or a job that is impossible for us to solve. Our techs are transparent about what it will take to make their home mouse-proofed. After the inspection, the customer decides whether they want us to come back. During the seal-up service, we use materials that other pest control companies do not. We make sure each entry point is sealed permanently, making it impossible for mice to chew through.

Minnesota Mouse Identification

Carpenter ants are often misidentified as termites. Termites have rectangular-shaped bodies, while carpenter ants’ bodies are unevenly shaped. Comparable to the number 8. Carpenter ants live in parent and satellite nests. Their colonies start in parent nests with the queen, larvae, pupae, and workers. Once this nest reaches full capacity, some of the worker ants will leave and create a satellite nest to help them forage for more food and raise more workers to help grow the colony. These satellite nests are commonly found inside homes. Carpenter ants do not eat and digest the wood. They locate water-damaged wood and chew small tunnels through it to store food, their larva, and pupae. 

Pavement ants are commonly found inside homes in Minnesota. Their diets consist of a variety of foods that are protein-rich or rich in sugar. Their diets can consist of: pet food, human food, seeds, nectar, insects, plants, and fruit. When they are found foraging inside, they are often in single-file lines known as ant trails. These ant trails lead to a food or water source and usually to an entry point into the room or outside. The ants are smaller than carpenter ants and have clubbed antennae. Their colors are somewhat similar, but are brown or brownish-black.

Ants live in social colonies. Only 10% of the ant colony ever leaves the nest. They are called foraging ants. The rest of the workers, larvae, pupa, and queen never leave the nest. Over-the-counter sprays only affect 10% of the ants that leave the nest. Our treatment allows the foraging ants to cross over the product without dying right away. This allows the ants to bring the product back inside their nests. When using over-the-counter products, the queen ant will not be affected. The ants may disappear for a day or 2 but they will always come back.

Minnesota Ant Identification

Paper wasp nests are commonly found under soffits, overhangs, and garage doors. The nests are not large and are built in areas that protect them from rain. Their nests are made out of a thin papery pulp. When it gets wet, the nest is destroyed. Their nests are also unique in that there is no outer layer of the nest and all the hexagonal cells are visible from the outside. By the end of fall, the wasps in the colony die, and the nest is not reused next spring.

Yellow jackets are a common wasp in Minnesota. When a yellow jacket nest is at its full capacity, there can be between 1,000 and 10,000 wasps in one nest. As their nests grow to these sizes, they become extremely aggressive. When people find their nests, they can be caught off guard. Their nests can vary in location and are often hard to find. They are built inside buildings, underground, inside trees, and in aerial nests (in the photo above). They will never reuse an old nest.

For social wasps, there is never a single moment when all the wasps are inside the nest. The wasps that leave the nest are foraging for food or nesting material. Over-the-counter wasp killers will not affect the entire colony. It will only kill the wasps that leave the nest. A product that kills the wasps instantly sounds good, but in reality, the queen will still be alive, reproducing more wasps inside the nest. The product that we use won’t kill the foragers on contact instead, they will carry it inside the nest and spread it to the queen.

Minnesota Wasp & Bee Identification

As most people know, spiders eat insects. They help our ecosystems by preventing insects from becoming overpopulated. There are 2 different ways they catch their prey. There are spiders known as web-building spiders that build webs that catch their food. Then there are hunting spiders. These spiders don’t build webs and hunt for their prey. Common web-building spiders include: the daddy-long-legs (aka harvestman), common house spider (in photo), and the yellow garden spider. As for the hunting spiders, the most common are the wolf spider, sac spider, and jumping spider.

Habitats that spiders prefer when inside include areas that are dark and often untouched. Some examples would be: under furniture, above cabinets, inside corners, and in any unfinished areas. All spiders that live outdoors are drawn to the same type of habitats. These habitats attract insects. Habitats near water attract insects like mosquitoes, flies, ticks, and other bugs. When an area has abundant insects, there will also be an abundance of spiders to eat them.

The service that we provide for spiders is thorough and effective. We focus our time and energy on the exterior of the home. We do this by first knocking down any cobwebs. When we treat the home, we focus on the foundation, corners, downspouts, overhangs, and light fixtures. The exterior barrier also affects the population of spiders living inside. As spiders move in and out of the structure, they will also cross over our treatment. The product stays effective for 2 months. Homes near bodies of water and wooded habitats require multiple treatments to keep the spiders off the home.

Read Our Blog “We Love Living Near Woods and Water and so do Spiders!”

 During the fall, these bugs can be seen clustering along the outside of homes and buildings in search of places to overwinter. They prefer to sit on south-facing walls to absorb the sun’s rays. During sunny days in the winter, boxelder bugs can be seen roaming around the inside. The sun will warm up the windows and the roof just enough for the bugs to have enough energy to wake up. They will not breed or lay eggs in the winter. In the spring and summer, boxelder bugs spend time living on female boxelder trees. These trees are where they mate, lay eggs, and eat. They feed on the helicopter seeds that the trees produce.

Stink bugs are a relatively new pest here in Minnesota. They were first recorded in 2010, and since then their population has exploded. In the fall, they fly from their breeding grounds to find places to overwinter. In the spring and summer, stink bugs live in agricultural fields and gardens. They eat the crops and lay their eggs on the leaves. They commonly feed on apples, sweet corn, grapes, and tomatoes. When they are visible inside in the winter. They are not breeding or laying eggs inside.

The service we provide for boxelder bugs and stink bugs is in the fall. The service is more effective when done before the first frost. The reason is that there is a high probability that some bugs have already moved inside for the winter. The service treatment is done on the exterior of the home. The product we use sticks to the house and stays effective for 2 months. As the insects land on the home, they will die before they can get inside. We treat the foundation up to the soffits, or as high as our equipment will reach. Both of these bugs can fly, so covering the entire siding is necessary for the service to be effective.

Read Our Blog “Minnesota Fall Pests”

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To protect your home from Insects join our Insect Protection Plan (IPP) 

If you have questions, concerns, or want to schedule an appointment 

Call Us Today! 952-404-BOGO (2646)

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