​With all the talk about the various diseases carried South by mosquitoes, we thought it time to let you know what kind of mosquitoes you might find around your Adelaide home and how to identify them.
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Research out of the Mosquito Research Laboratory at Uni SA has shown that there are 32 different varieties of mosquitoes found in South Australia. Of those, there are six most commonly found.

There are two main disease mosquitoes carry in Adelaide, Ross River virus and Barmah Forest virus. From time to time, we may also experience Murray Valley encephalitis or Kunjin virus.
The three most common carriers of disease are:
- Culex annulirostris
- Ochlerotatus vigilax
- Ochlerotatus camptorhynchus

It’s good to know that of these, Culex annulirostris is rarely found in Adelaide. Of the other two, vigilax bites during the warmer months & camptorhynchus in the cooler months and both are only outdoor biters. Vigilax is more commonly found in coastal and mangrove areas.

It’s not always practical to stay inside and unfortunately some mosquitoes prefer to live and bite indoors. That means that we need to have a number of things in our tool kit to prevent being bitten.

Mosquitoes are often breed in puddles and don’t like moving water. So we can make sure that our homes and gardens don’t offer them these places, including saucers of water, blocked drains or other places where water collects or pools (tyres, kids toys, wheelbarrows). Some mosquitoes prefer to breed in septic or rainwater tanks and keeping them sealed is the best prevention.
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Otherwise, wearing light coloured long sleeved tops and long pants reduces the area mosquitoes can access, using a suitable repellent, and ensuring the window/door screens are in good condition provide you with a last line of defence.
If you’re particularly concerned about mosquitoes, or any other insect, around your home it’s always best to contact an expert. We would like to thank the Uni SA for the information for this article and encourage you to contact the MD Pest Control Team with any other questions.  

​You do everything you should to keep your house clean but there goes another cockroach across the floor! The kitchen is clean every night. Pet food is tidy. Even the kids are keeping their room clean. So why are there still cockroaches in your clean home?

Like any home, sometime it comes down to location, location, location. We can’t always choose our neighbours and it can often be that their home is overrun with cockroaches and they need to find more food.
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In ADELAIDE the most commonly cockroach infested homes are found in: Salisbury, Norwood, Glenelg, the City and Prospect. Keep reading to learn the reasons why, it might not be what you expect. 

​Cockroaches are opportunistic critters and they don’t care how clean your house is, they are after food, shelter, & water – any of these three things. They can come in through cracks in the exterior walls, dryer vents, or even the gaps between walls and floors. If you give them the access, they will take that opportunity. 

We’ve just mentioned garages and behind pictures, but these are not the only forgotten places where cockroaches hang out in your home. Perhaps the cockroaches are getting in gaps between the skirting board and your underfloor space. Cockroaches can come in through poorly fitting doors and screens, or even small holes in screens. Then there’s all those other places around the outside of your home where they can come in, drains, vents, cracks etc.
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So while we would all think that a lack of cockroaches in our home comes down to keeping it clean, for some it’s a matter of luck (or bad luck when they get in). Realistically the best way to keep cockroaches out of your home is to have a regular general pest spray. This will not only keep the cockroaches out of your clean home, but also other pests such as ants and spiders.  Give Michael a call on  0407 614 220 or book a time online.