Top 5 House Insects in Northeast Ohio and How to Get Rid of Them

Have you ever woken up in the middle of the night to the sounds of bugs skittering across your walls? Maybe you’ve recently come home to find a parade of ants marching across your kitchen counters. Or maybe you’ve just noticed nests, damage, or debris caused by one of these pests.

Nobody likes to see or think about insects creeping and crawling around their house.

Aside from their unnerving presence, insects in the house can pose various health risks such as disease transmission, allergies, and food contamination. Not only do these pests pose the above safety risks, but they also make you feel uncomfortable in your own home. 

Thanks to Northeast Ohio’s rainy springs and humid summers, there are several common house insects that like to infiltrate houses.

So how can you keep these pesky pests from entering your home?

Knowledge is power, so it’s important to know the most common bugs in Ohio homes in order to prevent them.

Here’s how you can protect your home against common household bugs, and how we can help you do so.

Common House Bugs in Ohio

Here’s a look at the common household insects that top the list in Northeast Ohio. 

1. Ants

What They Look Like

Ants typically have three body parts:

• A head with two elbowed or bent antennae
• A thorax or the middle part of the body, where the legs are attached
• The abdomen, which is the larger body part at the back of the insect that contains the heart and digestive system

Ants can be as small as 1/32 inch to as large as 3/4 inch and can vary in color from black to brown to reddish.

Where They Hide

Ants typically enter the home in wetter seasons such as springtime when the ground is saturated, and they require a drier place to live.

Often, ants will congregate in damper areas of the home, such as the kitchen or bathroom, where there’s water available.

Signs of infestation may include ant trails, structural damage, or piles of dirt or wood shavings.

Prevention Tips

To keep ants away, eliminate food sources by keeping food in secured containers and cleaning up spills immediately. 

You should also take care to close off all possible entry points to your home, such as cracks in the walls and around windows and doors.

2. Centipedes

What They Look Like

House centipedes are easily identifiable by their long, segmented bodies. Other characteristics include:

• 1 to 2 inches in length
• Grayish-yellow in color
• Dark stripes on the body

Fun fact: Centipedes have one pair of legs per body segment, as opposed to millipedes, which have two pairs.

Where They Hide

Like ants, centipedes are often found in damp areas indoors like bathrooms and crawl spaces.

Because they are nocturnal and move quickly, they can be hard to spot, so if you do see any during the day, that could be a sign of a bigger problem.

Prevention Tips

Adding dehumidifiers in damp areas and removing hiding places such as gaps in floors and walls, debris piles, and garbage can deter these insects from entering your house.

3. Spiders

What They Look Like

Spiders’ bodies are divided into two regions that are separated by a narrow connection. They also possess the following attributes:

• Eight legs
• Eight eyes
• The ability to spin silk (otherwise known as their webs)

Where They Hide

Spiders typically retreat to quieter hiding spots within the home that have access to food and water.

Seeing multiple spiders in various locations of a home, experiencing unexplained insect bites, and spotting webs and spider droppings may indicate you have a spider problem on your hands.

Prevention Tips

To keep spiders from coming into your home, you should tighten up potential entry points, remove potential food sources, and generally keep your home clean and free of clutter. You may also want to eliminate cracks and gaps within your home, remove cobwebs, and vacuum regularly. 

4. Stink Bugs

What They Look Like

Stink bugs are most easily recognized by their shield-shaped bodies.Other identifying facts include:

• Adult stink bugs can reach up to 2 centimeters in length.
• They come in various colors, but are commonly brown with mottled patterns and lighter markings.
• Nymphs are immature stink bugs that also feature a shieldlike shape and can be black in color with red or orange markings.

Where They Hide

Stink bugs can be enticed into your home by several factors: warmth, light, food sources, and entry points. 

They are especially drawn to outdoor porch lights and indoor lights visible from the outside and typically enter the home when temperatures drop as they seek warmer places to overwinter.

While they may be seen near windows or doors when they first enter your home, stink bugs prefer to spend the winter cozying up inside of walls, attics, or crawl spaces.

Prevention Tips

To keep stink bugs from entering your home, seal cracks, crevices, and openings in your foundation, windows, doors, and siding.

Keep your home clean and close away any potential food sources. 

5. Earwigs

What They Look Like

Earwigs are common house bugs about the size of a penny and dark or reddish-brown in color. They can also be identified by the following features:

• They have six pincers at the tip of their abdomen that are modified legs. Fun fact: Males feature curved pincers and females have straighter ones.
• They have two pairs of wings even though they rarely fly.
• Earwigs have long and flattened bodies that appear leathery.
• Their antennae are long and flexible and extend from the head.

Where They Hide
Earwigs prefer dark, damp, and enclosed spaces, such as crawl spaces and basements, as well as areas located near windows or doors. You can also find them under sinks, around baseboards, and in other areas where moisture is present, like in bathrooms. 

Because earwigs are generally attracted to areas with food sources and moisture, they may also be found under furniture, in cardboard boxes, or even in piles of clothing. 

Prevention Tips

To keep earwigs out of your home, consider eliminating moisture by fixing leaks, adding a dehumidifier to humid spaces, and ensuring your home has good ventilation. 

You can also take away potential entry points by sealing off cracks and crevices around the foundation, windows, and doors. Be sure to also remove debris, mulch, or woodpiles away from the house.

How to Defend Your Home From Common Household Insects

To keep many of these common bugs from entering your home, prevention is the first line of defense.

Insects don’t need a lot of space to get inside, and there are many areas you may be overlooking. To recap, there are several things you as a homeowner can do to keep your home free of the above pests:

• Fix cracks in your home’s foundation
• Address siding that may be coming apart from the house
• Properly seal window or door frames
• Keep items such as ground covers, wood piles and other objects away from the home because pests like to hide and nest in these items
• Keep your home clean and tidy

The second line of defense against bugs in the home comes from a perimeter pest control applied by your local pest control provider. 

To help your home stay free of bugs, Turf Pride technicians apply a barricade treatment along the foundation of the house, around window and door frames, and even around sliding glass doors on decks. The barrier prevents crawling pests from getting in. If they come into contact with that barrier, they die.

This barrier product is not harmful to children or pets, and applications dry fairly quickly, so you can go about your usual activities within about an hour.

Typically, a technician will visit every 30 days to ensure the barrier remains effective throughout the course of a five-visit treatment plan.

Call in your local pest management professional when the weather is nicer and before the first insects are spotted for the best preventive control.

Why Go With A Professional Pest Control Service

If you’ve tried DIY methods that haven’t worked and are sick and tired of insects invading your home, it’s high time you call in a team of experts from your local pest control company. 

In areas like Mentor, Painesville, Willoughby, and nearby suburbs, the team at Turf Pride Lawn Care has you covered.

Turf Pride offers pest control services that are convenient, affordable, and easy to set up. 

With their knowledge of local pests and insight into how to get rid of them, the technicians at Turf Pride Lawn Care can sweep away your worries about the common house insects that keep you up at night.

Call in the experts at Turf Pride to ensure your home is home clean, safe, and pest-free. Get started today with a free quote.

Image Source: Ants, Centipede, Spider, Stink Bugs, Earwigs