New England and the northeastern United States experienced higher winter temperatures and the expectation is that spring will be much the same. This may translate to earlier and more active ant colonies, bringing foraging workers in and around your facilities as they search for food to grow and help sustain their colonies. Early inspection and treatment for ants is recommended to suppress or eliminate colonies before they rapidly grow and become even more of a nuisance.
Meteorologists have forecasted above average rainfall for the region which could, in combination with higher temperatures, lead to higher numbers of both mosquitoes and large flies. For mosquitoes, it's essential to remove as many sources of standing water as possible from around your building to disrupt their life cycle and prevent mass emergences of adults that bite and could potentially vector disease.
Ecolab's Large Fly Program uses an outside-in strategy to focus on eliminating flies and the conditions that support them from the outside where they are breeding to reduce populations and therefore, the number of flies that could make it indoors and cause problems. What can you do to help? Step up exclusion efforts by keeping doors and windows shut or tightly screened while paying close attention to how trash and recycling are handled throughout your facility. Trash and recycling bins, including dumpsters, should be emptied frequently and cleaned to prevent fly attraction and development.
Ticks are a major public health concern in this region due primarily to the prevalence of Lyme disease. Providing education to your employees/teams about the risks of ticks and how to be tick-safe is valuable, even if your facility presents a very low risk of tick populations. Facilities that have grounds or areas that abut ecotones or tall grass/forests area do carry risks of ticks and deserve management considerations.
When it comes to commensal rodents, mice continue to be the predominant pain point in the northeast. Taking advantage of old infrastructure and stable human populations, mice have entrenched themselves in cities and aggressively invade human spaces. They will continue to be a challenge with some populations rivaling rats in their tenacity and survivability.
Midwest/OH Valley/Great Lakes
The Midwest and Ohio Valley regions also experienced a warm winter coupled with, in some places, way below average snowfall and rainfall. Entering a warmer, drier spring than usual could see moisture-seeking pests like ants aggressively foraging and even nesting indoors when they find a good, consistent source of moisture. Early inspection and treatment for ants is recommended to suppress or eliminate colonies before they rapidly grow and become even more of a nuisance. This could also be true for occasional invaders which typically live on the exterior perimeter and are associated with mulch and leaf litter - Think earwigs, springtails, pillbugs, and millipedes. If there is insufficient moisture in their normal environment, they will follow moisture gradients toward and into buildings.
A mild winter may have also led to greater numbers of surviving overwintering pests like wasp queens, multi-colored Asian lady beetles, brown marmorated stink bugs, boxelder bugs, and cluster flies. If more of these pests were able to survive the winter, we should anticipate greater numbers of their populations the rest of the year. This may be a bad year for yellowjackets, paper wasps, and baldfaced hornets and proactive inspection and treatment should be prioritized to tamp down numbers and help protect your employees and guests during the late spring through fall. For all those other overwintering groups, we may not truly feel the effect of elevated numbers until they begin gathering en masse to overwinter indoors in late summer to early fall. Efforts to exclude these pests should begin in early summertime and wrap up prior to August, for best results.
Mouse pressure is high continuing down the coast and begins switching to strong roof rat pressure towards the Carolinas with roof rat hot spots in Virginia and South Carolina, and areas of mixed rodent activity in some locations. Moving away from the coast into the Midwest, mice remain the predominant species although lessening in pressure. This pattern is expected to continue with roof rats slowly expanding their influence northwards along the coast.
