The Ultimate Pest Control Checklist for Your Home

How should you use this home pest control checklist?

Set aside about an hour on a dry afternoon. Bring a strong flashlight, your phone for photos and a notepad; a photo of a gap or a dropping is far easier to compare three months later than a memory. Pests travel from the outside in and from the ground up, so check in that order.

1. 1

   Walk the perimeter twice

   Once at arm's length from the foundation, once from the lot line so you can see the roof, gutters and branches touching the house.

2. 2

   Test the shell from inside

   On a sunny day, turn off the basement and garage lights. Daylight around a door, pipe or sill marks an opening a mouse can use.

3. 3

   Go room by room, bottom to top

   Start in the basement and finish in the attic.

4. 4

   Sort what you find

   Label each item a quick fix, a weekend project or a job for a professional, and handle water problems first.

Yard by yard: keep pests out before they reach the walls

• Trim shrubs and vines 12 to 18 inches back from the siding so the foundation dries and ants lose their bridge.
• Cut limbs that hang over the roof; squirrels and carpenter ants use them as a road.
• Pull mulch a few inches off the foundation and keep it thin. Wet mulch against the sill invites termites and millipedes.
• Stack firewood about 20 feet from the house and off the ground.
• Empty buckets, tarps, saucers and clogged gutters. In summer heat, mosquitoes can go from egg to adult in about a week.
• Keep trash in lidded cans and store birdseed and pet food in metal or heavy plastic bins.
• If your lot backs onto woods, as many do near Ridley Creek State Park and the Crum, mow the lawn edge and rake back leaf litter, where blacklegged ticks wait.
• Look under decks and porches for burrows, droppings and small paper nests.

Pest-proof your home's shell: gaps, doors and the roofline

A house mouse fits through a gap about 1/4 inch wide, roughly the size of a dime. Age makes sealing harder here: Census (ACS) estimates put the median Delaware County home at 1957, and years of settling open sills, mortar joints and old pipe holes.

• Door sweeps on every exterior door, including the one from the garage into the house.
• A garage door seal with no gaps at the corners.
• Gas, AC, dryer, hose bib and cable openings packed with copper mesh and sealed.
• Sill plate gaps and foundation cracks closed; crumbling mortar in stone foundations repointed.
• Intact window screens and covered, draining window wells.
• Dryer and exhaust vent flaps that close fully, screened soffit vents and a capped chimney.
• Downspouts carrying water several feet from the foundation.

Room by room: a home pest inspection checklist for inside

In every room, look for food, water and hiding places. Take away any one of them and most household pests struggle to settle in.

• Kitchen: pull out the stove and refrigerator each season and clean underneath; check under the sink for leaks and pipe gaps; keep dry goods in sealed containers.
• Bathrooms: fix drips and running toilets, re-caulk tubs, and watch damp corners for silverfish and drain flies.
• Bedrooms: check mattress seams and headboard edges for small dark spots or shed skins after travel or guests.
• Living areas: vacuum baseboards and check window sills in fall for dead lady beetles or stink bugs.
• Basement: run a dehumidifier in humid months, store items in bins off the floor, and check the sump pit and sill plate for mud tubes or droppings.
• Attic: look for droppings, chewed insulation and daylight around vents, and listen at dusk for scratching.
• Garage: seal pet food and grass seed, and break down cardboard that mice and cockroaches use for shelter.

Seasonal home maintenance for pests: what to check and when

Pest pressure in southeastern Pennsylvania shifts with the weather, so the same house needs different attention in April than in October.

Do it yourself, or set up a recurring visit?

Many homeowners work through the list themselves and call only when something slips past it. Others prefer someone to check entry points and refresh exterior treatments on a calendar, which is how our quarterly pest control plans run. Either works if the checks happen; the usual failure is skipping fall. For an overview of what we treat, see our home pest control services.

When is a pest prevention checklist not enough?

A checklist prevents problems; it does not remove an established one, and sealing an active infestation can trap pests inside the walls. If you see any sign below, book a free pest inspection and you will get a written quote before any treatment. Termite clues deserve a prompt look; our termite control page explains the next steps.

• Droppings in cabinets, drawers or along basement walls.
• Mud tubes on the foundation, or piles of small wings near spring windows.
• Rust-colored spots on mattress seams, or bites in a short line.
• Live cockroaches out in daylight.
• Steady wasp traffic in and out of one spot in a wall or the ground.
• Fine sawdust below wood trim, or scratching inside walls at night.