Category Archives: Stink Bugs

If you are looking for ways to get rid of stink bugs, you have come to the right place.

Stink bugs emerge in the spring after “over-wintering”, then will attempt to stay warm by sunbathing on the side of homes and businesses. They may enter the structure, get confused and emerge on the inside of the dwelling. At this point, they are interested in staying the walls, they are simply just trying to stay warm. You may see them around windows, air conditioners, or you may even see stink bugs emerging from the fireplace. In any event, it may be freaky to see them in house or your place of business. They may be easily controlled with a micro-encapsulated insecticide, if treated at the right time, or treated consistently. For instance, our company treats homes and businesses quarterly for stink bugs. This prevents them from entering in the first place, or keeps them “dying at the door”, so to say.

Over the summertime, most people do not see stink bugs because they are content living outside and the warmth of summer is something that allows them to stay outside.  But, in the northeast, stink bugs prepare to “over-winter” when it starts to get cooler at night.  Then, stink bugs begin to look for places around structures like homes and businesses that are emitting or “leaking” heat.  This could something as simple as your eaves, louvers, windows, doors.  Or it could be the chimney or wall-mounted air conditioners.   In any event, their goal is to spend the winter in your walls.  The problem is, if they successfully get in, it is difficult to get them out before next spring.  Worse yet, stink bugs feel the heat from the inside of your home, then begin to press in trying to get to the heat source.  As it gets colder outside, the stinkers try harder to get in.  This is where it gets bad.

If you begin to see the stink bugs in the middle of the winter, you have waited too long to treat them from the outside.  However, using an insecticide dust, or powder such as Delta Dust, you may control them by keeping them dying before they emerge from the wall voids.  But all this can be prevented by treating the perimeter of the home in the early fall.  In the video below Dominion Pest Control owner, Gregory Pettis was filmed by a local newspaper, displaying not only places to look for stink bugs, but a treatment using the micro-encapsulated product, Demand CS.  This insecticide has a microscopic bubble around the active ingredient, making it stable outside (and inside) for months, thus preventing stink bugs from entering.

As you can see from the video, stink bugs were emerging from the air conditioner.  A perimeter treatment could have stopped them before they got in, but in this case they were able to be controlled due to Gregory’s experience in finding and treating areas where stink bugs overwinter.  In the next video below, veteran pest control technician Christopher Komarow has to figure out how to get rid of stink bugs in a home where the bugs where coming down the chimney and emerging into the living room.  It is not easy to do, but you can take care of this situation by treating around the fireplace and the perimeter of the home before the stink bugs arrive.

As you can see in this stink bug video, Christopher does a good job treating the problem as the homeowner explains that he had the same problem last year.  The key here is to treat the exterior quarterly.