April 27, 2025 • 35 mins
Dean and Sue talk about California’s ankle biter mosquitos and how the UV bug zappers don’t work for them. Sue discusses a product that helps control mosquito population. They share tips on getting rid of rodents from attics. Dean and Sue talked about all forms of pest control and ant control.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
KFI AM six forty. You're listening to Dean Sharp The
House Whisper on demand on the iHeartRadio app. Hey, you
know that this very programmed. This one, this live broadcast
is also known as the House Whisperer podcast that you
can listen to anytime, anywhere on demand. Hundreds of episodes,
(00:23):
all searchable by topic. It is truly your home improvement
reference library. About an hour after we go off the
air today, every minute of this show, this pest control
special show with my special guest Sue Freeze from Ecola,
will be on the podcast site there for you to
listen to as often as you like, anytime you like,
(00:47):
from anywhere on demand until the end of time. Well
that may be an extreme but for a long long time.
Let's just say that much as well. Okay, so don't
out on all the episodes of the House Whisper podcast.
And if you're just tuning in and you've missed part
of today's show, then it's going to be waiting for you.
(01:07):
There you can hear the whole thing. This is the broadcast,
and then whenever you want the podcast. That's how it works.
And if you're thinking, hey, that's all great, Dean but
what I really need is you and Tina standing in
our house. Well, you can do that too. You can
book an in home design consult with me and Tea.
Just go to house whisperer dot Design for more details.
(01:29):
House Whisperer dot Design. Okay, Sue Freeze my special guest
owner operator of Ecola Ecola Eco La Pest Control. And
it's time to talk about mosquitos. And I set it
all up. I baited everybody at the end of the
last segment. Uh, mosquitos are a huge problem for everybody,
(01:51):
regardless whether you own a home, rent, doesn't matter, if
you're outside on your patio space, they're there. They want you.
They are going to get you.
Speaker 2 (02:01):
They get you whether you like it or not. So
they like it.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
And I and I mentioned that there's a lot of
there's a lot of misinformation about mosquitos out there because
there are a lot like if you were to go
on Amazon right now, I'm just saying, and I love Amazon, Okay,
nothing faulting it, but if you go on Amazon right
now and you put in mosquito, uh, you know, control
or anything like that in the search window, you're going
to get a ton of companies saying here by our
(02:25):
little you know UV light with the Zappa bug zapper. Okay,
mosquitos are not attracted to UV light sources and so
guess what. Nope, not gonna do it. But Sue has
a system, tell.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
Us you we do, and we started it. I think
it was last year. I don't think it was here before,
but maybe it was time flies.
Speaker 3 (02:46):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (02:47):
I have to say, I've been in this business for
forty six years and mosquitoes weren't as aggressive as they
are now. Have you found that to be true? For me?
It's true. So we have a product. It's called into Care.
You could go to our website and get a lot
of it education on it at termite lady dot com
and into Care as a mosquito it's a green mosquito
control system using traps that attract and kill eighties mosquitoes
(03:10):
that do carries zycha sorry ezca. It uses larva side
and a fungus to kill adult mosquitoes and prevent larval development. Now,
the effectiveness of this product reduces It reduces mosquito populations
by seventy to ninety percent in treated areas, and that's
per manufacturer studies. Now to what does it look like
(03:33):
what you know. What happens next, we come out and
normally on an average size home, if you've got a
pool or just you want to get in the backyard
and enjoy your backyard with your barbecue and all of
those things. We put two of these bait stations out
and they kind of look like speakers and again if
you can just.
Speaker 1 (03:51):
Like those, like an in ground landscaping speaker, exactly like that.
Speaker 2 (03:55):
And it's two of those normally, and then we put
you on a monthly service only during this summer season
when the mosquitoes are out and we have to put
a new bait program in it. It touches the water.
There's water inside of it.
Speaker 1 (04:08):
The oh, so that's that's what these mosquitos look.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
So they're attracted to the water. And then we put
this bait program on top of it and it leaches
down into the water and the mosquitoes come in and
they set down on their little pads you've seen them.
They sit on top of the water. They get infected
with this product. Then they fly away from there, because
you know they do that. They land and then they
fly away and they look for another source of water,
(04:32):
probably on your property and they move that product that
they got on their little pads to the next place,
like in a pond or a pool or a bird feeder.
The best thing about this and that's what kills it.
It kills the larval and it kills the adults. Takes
a little time, but they are moving this product around
(04:54):
so that it's getting more population breakdown. Also, it doesn't
affect fish, because that's the next question you were going
to ask.
Speaker 1 (05:04):
It doesn't want How did you know that? Yeah, well,
of course, yeah, I just want to make.
Speaker 2 (05:08):
Sure effect the birds. It doesn't affect your dog taking
a lick of that water. It doesn't do anything anything
except for the mosquitos, which is the target pest, and
that's what we're going after. Another thing that we do
is we fog underneath foliage. If you've got a really
extreme problem, then we would do a fogging under the foliage.
And I'm looking outside Dean's La Area here right now,
(05:29):
and I'm just like, oh, it would be amazing to
do this do this place anyway. So that's what we do,
and it is effective, and we would love to be
able to do that with you.
Speaker 1 (05:39):
So the two critical components there that we're talking about
is if there are mosquitos in your yard, number one,
we got to reduce population. And number two, we want
to get them the ones that are there, we want
to get them away from us. Yes, right, So mosquitos
zero in on carbon dioxide plumes that come out of
us because we exhale carbon dietee, so we are like
(06:01):
little we're like little cloud plumes of saying I'm over here.
But the cool thing about the into care these these
bait stations. Number one, they're super low profile and they
just kind of go away. But number two, they are
more attractive to the mosquitos than we are. Therefore, if
(06:21):
there are mosquitos in the yard, they will find it
first and then it so that it accomplishes the number
one task of getting the mosquitoes off of us. And
there are other things like that, like there are big
You can use a propane tank with a special dispersement
on the top, set it off in the corner of
your property, and it throws up a massive, massive CO
(06:46):
two plume, which of course is not great for the environment,
not great for the atmosphere. But the point is bigger
than people, and therefore the mosquitos go there instead. But
the INTWO Care system does the exact same thing without
all the co two stuff, And then while it's attracting
them away from us, it's also causing them to be
(07:06):
the carrier of their own doom, which I'm all for.
When it comes to mosquitoes, I love all sorts of nature,
but I got to say I have no love lost
between me and mosquitos whatsoever. So just like they are
so good, I mean, here's the thing. Mosquitoes are technically
the most dangerous creature on the planet. They are the
(07:29):
carriers of malaria. Mosquitoes are responsible for killing more people
every year than any than all other creatures combined together.
They are the most dangerous living thing on this planet
as far as a animal life form, because they are
such efficient carriers of zeka, malaria, dengay fev. I mean,
(07:51):
you name it. So here it is. The Into Care
system is using the efficacy of their carrying systems against them,
which I think is just the most beautiful, wonderful thing ever.
And so you're reducing populations and getting pulling mosquitoes away
from people and the covers on the Into Care system,
(08:14):
they won't allow dogs or cats or pets to get
you can't get to the water, and kids can't get
to the water. The water. That stuff doesn't bother fish,
it doesn't, you know. So it's just a really really
smart system, a very very smart system. So if you've
got a mosquito issue, you need to give a Cola
call and talk to them about it. I think it's
(08:36):
time for us to talk about rodents.
Speaker 2 (08:37):
Okay, can I tell you a story that happened to me?
Speaker 1 (08:40):
Yes, when we come back, because they're going to they're
going to start throwing cans at me if I don't
go to break. But so you have a rodent story.
Speaker 2 (08:48):
I have three?
Speaker 1 (08:49):
Oh, okay, we'll pick the best one and then we'll
go from there and we'll talk about getting rodents out
of the house. You are listening to Home a Dean
Sharp the House Whisper.
Speaker 3 (09:00):
You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on demand from
KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
Today we're talking pest control with my very special in
studio guests, Sue Freeze from Ekola Pest Control. She is
the owner and the operator one of the most innovative
pest control companies of the most innovative pest control company
and Conscientious Pest Control company that I know, which makes
it my absolute favorite pest control company in all of
(09:29):
southern California. We've talked about termites and alternative treatments for termites.
We've talked about skeeters, We've taken calls. I think it's
time for us to talk about the rats, rats and
mice and rodent. Do you have a story?
Speaker 2 (09:46):
I do have a story, and it's funny because you
know it has nothing to do with sanitation. Really it can,
but not always. And you know, there are no respectors
of anybody. They just you know, they show up and
then they reproduce every thirty days. And mice and rats,
you know, there's anywhere from eight new ones to fifteen
new ones, maybe even twenty on some cases between mice
(10:08):
and rats. And you can tell the difference between mice
and rats as far as they're poop. I know it
sounds funny, but mice usually there's pointed poop, and rats
it's usually blunt at the end. So if you're wondering
about that, because you know there are baby rats, and
you still got to know if they're a rat or
a mice. My story is is that I have a
lake house and I looked out my backyard and I
(10:28):
found a rat that was staring at me outside, and
I'm like, oh, there's a rat out there. And I
have lived I've had this house for I don't know
five years, never seen a rat before. It's right on
the lake. It's not on a barn or anything. So
I thought, uh, oh, because where there's one, there's more.
Just remember that if you see one mouse, if you
(10:50):
see one rat, there's more.
Speaker 1 (10:52):
Oh yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (10:53):
So anyway, so a couple of weeks went by and
we were getting ready to go on a trip, and
it was at night because they're nocturnal and at night,
and I was walking in all of a sudden, I
see some mallet corner of my eye in the house,
not outside the house, in the house. Can you relate?
How's this happen to you? So then I'm thinking of
now they found it found inside. A week goes by.
(11:16):
We tried to find that one. We did what we
needed to do to get rid of the one, but
we knew there were more, and so we went to
the outside look for openings. This is what we need
to do, look for openings, because they started outside and
then they're coming inside. So they got to find a
way in, and why would they want to come in?
Because they need food, they need water, and they need shelter.
That's what they need. We don't want to give it
to them, and we want to close off so that
(11:39):
they don't get in. So that's called an exclusion, and
Nicola offers exclusions. So I guess I needed an exclusion.
We went around and we found the holes. It was
a new air conditioner was put in. There was a
hole that had got magnified by everything, and so that's
how they went made their way in. So I'll just
get right to the bottom of this. Come to find
(11:59):
out out underneath my sink and you might have this too,
there is a kickplate, and underneath my sink there is
a false floor, and all my cleansers and all my
wonderful things was in there. We had to pull that out,
and then we had to pull that whole thing up
and found that there was a nest under there. They
were pulling the nesting out of my dishwasher, and I'm
(12:20):
nesting on the floor. When I woke up in the morning,
I could not find out for the life of me
what was going on. So there was a whole family
in there, and they'd been in there for quite a while,
but I never knew it. So this could be happening
to you.
Speaker 1 (12:31):
So what do you do?
Speaker 2 (12:33):
Okay, you call somebody that knows how to deal with this,
and part of it is exclusion. We do inspections, We
do exclusion, which means closing up any openings. And then
what we do is we will set traps on the
inside because if we've closed them in, they can't get out.
We've got to get them out because otherwise they're gonna
die and they're gonna smell, and you do not want that.
(12:53):
And I highly recommend not baiting these rats because you
never know where they're going to die. They could die
inside your wall. You don't want that. So that's what
we do. And then we will trap, get the things,
get the rats out of there. We've closed it up
to where they can't get in, and that's what we do.
Speaker 1 (13:09):
So you want to trap the rats that are inside
the House of the roads, you trap them because because
if you poison them by baiting, you mean poison, then
they could die anywhere anyway where we can't get.
Speaker 2 (13:20):
Right, So you got to knock out a drywall wall
or something, and that's not good.
Speaker 1 (13:24):
So, yes, I and I talk about this all the time.
When people are calling me asking me about rodent questions
and they're like, how do I get rodents out of
my yard, I'm like, I don't know. I mean, because again,
this is my point. I have yet to find any
value of going to war with the natural world. It's
(13:45):
going to win. There's just more of them than there
are you know of me, right, So I don't want
to war with the rodents around my property. I don't
want to go to war with them. I want to
find a way to a detail a date haunt like
you know, like I stay on this side of the wall,
and you stay on that side of the wall, and
(14:05):
that's on avoid. I mean, we have chickens, and if
you have chickens, you have rats. That's like the second
rule that that you why it has nothing to do
with clean leaves. The fact that I got chicken feeders
out there and they're like, hey.
Speaker 2 (14:17):
Food in the middle of the day, easy food, right,
and you know, so so.
Speaker 1 (14:21):
They're gonna be They're gonna be rodents around scurrying around
the property, and we're just like, hey, we have to
accept that they're not hurting anybody. They're they're they don't
want they're not coming at us. Okay, they're here for
other reasons, but not in the house. No, no, down boy, no,
not in the house. So exclusion is the key, right
(14:43):
to deter and exclude them from being able to come
in the house. And that means going around and finding
anything that's like half an inch, you know, gap or larger,
because they'll get in there.
Speaker 2 (14:52):
We say half an inch, you say it's a dime.
For a mouse, it's a dim, and for a rat
it's a quarter. But you're saying a half inch. So
that might be because they.
Speaker 1 (15:00):
Well, I mean a diamond. A diamond, that's a dime.
That's a half an inch. Yeah, so a half inch,
So a dime sized hole will will a mouse can
get through that, And we're like, no way. But if
you've ever seen one of those things wet now, all
that toff and fluff.
Speaker 2 (15:14):
They can their skeleton just can't.
Speaker 1 (15:16):
Yeah, they can get in there. They can make it happen.
All right, let's talk more about this on the other
side of the news.
Speaker 3 (15:22):
You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on demand from
KFI A M six forty.
Speaker 1 (15:29):
You are Home with Dean sharp the house whisper. Are
you at home? Well, you're at home with me. That's
just the way it works around here. Whether you're out
running errands, listening, whether i've I mean your ear as
you're walking the dog, or whether you're at home or
doing something anything. When you are with us here on
the program, I want you to feel at home because
(15:50):
we're talking about all things home every weekend, every Saturday
morning from six to eight Pacific time, every Sunday morning
nine to noon Pacific time. And I'm sitting here in
studio with my very very special guest, Sue Freeze, the
owner operator of Ecola Pest Control, and we've been talking
about all things pest control this morning. If you've missed
(16:12):
the show, don't don't you know, don't don't dismay and
catch us on the podcast and listen to everything that
you missed. But so far, what have we covered. We've
covered termites, all sorts of things about termites. We've talked
about mosquitoes. Now we're talking about rodents and part of it.
So we've we've got the whole okay, exclude thing down,
(16:34):
but rodents, attics, attic insulation, that's a whole Magilla in
and of itself, So let's talk about that.
Speaker 2 (16:43):
Okay. So rodents they you know, what do they do?
They poop, they pee, and usually it's in your attic.
And if you hear any p pitter pattern, you know,
need to call somebody, right because don't ignore it. It's
not going away. They're not going away.
Speaker 1 (16:57):
They're up there for a reason. They are up there
love and life.
Speaker 2 (17:00):
Yeah, they're usually nesting, but they're living up there and
they're doing things that you don't want them to do.
And when you think about see for me, with the
asthma and everything, the indoor air quality is so important
to our lives. So you don't want to have poop
go into powder form and then you turn on your air,
you turn on your heat, and then what's happening is
(17:21):
that that air and those particles are going through the
vents and everything and into your indoor air quality. So
you don't want to be breathing that. When we come
and do a roadent inspection, we're looking for that, we're
looking for the rodents. We're looking on how to exclude
the rodents from being in your house, and then we
have to clean out your attic if they've been living
(17:42):
up there, so we do that also, we clean it
all out, We sanitize it, deudorize it, get it all clean,
and then we have this program. It's called TAP Thermal
Acoustical Pest Control and it's insulation cellulo spased product treated
with boric acid to detour pests, cockroaches, ants, termites, and
(18:03):
rodents while providing thermal and sound insulation. It's marked as
eco friendly, reducing pesticide use, and that's what we use.
So it's blown in, it's treated with the boric acid,
and the effectiveness is it repels roaches and rodents by
creating an inhospitable environment. Boric acid disrupts digestion. Studies show
(18:24):
seventy to ninety percent reduction in roach populations and treated buildings.
So we've done everything. We've done the rodent inspection, the
rodent exclusion, we've trapped anything that's been caught up in there.
Then we clean out your attic and then we put
the TAP in that insulation in there and it saves
you energy. So it's got a lot of things that
(18:46):
we can do. Now if you haven't had a rodent problem,
but you still want to get better energy savings, we
can up the amount of insulation that you have in
your attic to get the maximum energy savings that you
can get. So both ways we can take care of you.
Speaker 1 (19:02):
Yeah, and now, so let me talk to about this
from the builder side of things. Okay, people call me
all the time because they know I say, insulate the attic,
reinsulate the attic. If you can't afford anything else to
get your heating and cooling bills under control, ad attic insulation,
and people are quite often surprised when they ask me
(19:23):
what's the best attic insulation, Dean. They assume I'm going
to say roll bat insulation, fiberglass bat insulation, because I
think we all have this romantic notion, probably by movies
and TV of these big, walkable, livable attic spaces up there.
So we like the idea that it's all neat and
clean and and it won't be itchy or anything like that.
(19:46):
And you know, if you have a giant pitched roof
and you can afford to spend time in your attic,
you know I'm not going to be the one to
stop you from doing that. But the point is this
bat style insulation, the stuff that come in rolls is
the least effective form of insulation in an attic. And
(20:06):
the reason is you have all of this heat and
or cool moving in between the attic space and the
floor below. We want a solid blanket, and a bad insulation.
Number one only fits in between the wood joists, the
ceiling joist stuff there. It doesn't cover the joists themselves,
so that every piece of wood then becomes a leak
(20:28):
in the attic. That's number one. Number two is that
it's easily compressible. So easily compressible, and you can't compress
insulation and maintain it's our value, and so bad insulation
usually doesn't get cut neatly around recess canlights or anything
else like that. So I always tell people blown in insulation,
(20:50):
And my favorite kind of blown in insulation is blown
in cellulose insulation because of the borates. And now you
said boric acid, And I know why you said it,
because that's the thing that ultimately repels and messes with
all the bugs and the rodents up there. They don't
like it at all. A lot of people would think, oh,
(21:12):
you know, the cool thing about cellulose insulation treated with
borates is that as a human being, we can handle it.
And it doesn't leave you with itchy skin. It doesn't.
You can get up there and it doesn't leave you.
Why because it's not fiberglass. There aren't shards of glass
being shoved into your skin on a microscopic level. And
you would think, well, the rats wouldn't like the fiberglass.
(21:33):
Oh no, they love it. They love fiberglass. That's why
they're in your net attic nesting because they love that stuff.
But they don't love the borates. And just to give
a little perspective on borates, boric acid comes from borates,
and borate is a mineral. You guys remember boraxo, that
(21:55):
soap that you know, that gritty kind of soap. Yeah,
it's it's it's a it's a mineral that is that
is naturally occurring. And it also helps in to cut
down on mildew and water retention and insulation. So it
literally is the best kind of insulation in my opinion,
(22:15):
because it serves all of these other purposes. A big
thick blanket blown across you can increase the R value
as much as you want in your attic and keep
your attic minimally you know, insect and rodent friendly.
Speaker 2 (22:30):
It's also fire retarded. Yes, yes, so it's got a
lot of added benefits.
Speaker 1 (22:35):
It really is. And so that's the insulation you guys
use when you do out do a cleanout. And that's
just great, great stuff.
Speaker 3 (22:43):
All right, you're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on
Demand from KFI A M six forty.
Speaker 1 (22:53):
We are here sitting in studio with my very special guest,
Sue Freeze from E Cola Pest Control, my very favorite,
my top referral. So many of you ask me, Dean,
can you refer me to this and this? And you know,
there are certain there are certain services, certain companies that
are fantastic that I would love to refer to everybody,
(23:17):
but they're very localized, and you know, quite often building
is a very localized game. And so some of my
favorite contractors, some of my favorite service providers, you know,
I can only refer them to you if you live
within you know, fifteen miles or so, you know, because
most of things having to do with homes tend to
be very very small businesses on the big scale of things.
(23:40):
But there are other service providers who have proven themselves
to be so excellent and have a very wide coverage
and service range. Ecola Pest Control is one of those companies.
So they are in that very very special category where
wherever you live in southern California, if you are going
to add, ask me who is the past control company
(24:03):
that should come out to my home. I'm just telling
you right now you got to call Ecola Eco La
call the termite lady. We have been talking all morning
about all forms. During the break, Sue, you and I
were talking about ants. I asked you about ants and
you said that it's a very kind of targeted approach
to ants, that you don't just come out and do
(24:24):
the nuclear blast, but that you kind of hunt down
the colony, find the line, find the colony and so on,
which is brilliant. And again that's why I love you guys,
because you're so conscious you want to just do enough
and not too much. But that led to you said
that you practice IPM, and I want you to explain
(24:46):
IPM to everybody.
Speaker 2 (24:47):
Integrated Pest Management. It's where we identify the bug because
we're the experts. We identify the past, and then we
know where they live. You know what they like, what
they dislike, and we follow it back to the colony
because what we need to do is get to the colony.
We don't need to do a blast, We don't need
to power spread the whole backyard or the whole front
yard anymore. So we just look for where they are
(25:09):
and we take care of it right there, so it's
less invasive for the homeowner and animals and everything else
for that matter. So that's what integrated past management is.
Speaker 1 (25:20):
Would you say that if a homeowner is going to
attempted to kind of diy their own pest control, that
they're going to do too little or too much.
Speaker 2 (25:31):
Usually what they do is they'll go someplace and they'll
get the product, and if they followed the directions, it
would say one cup or one whatever. But what happens,
and I've heard it from many people that do this
themselves when I'm at a party or wherever, and they say, oh,
one glug's good, two glugs is better, And so they're
putting twice as much product as they need to put
(25:54):
on there to get rid of the problem. Plus they
don't know what we know as far as where to
place it, what to do. So we look for, you know,
like there's certain things where we have to cut back
something or we have to get rid of this source
or we have to do this or that. So when
we know all of that, we together with the customer, you, homeowner,
(26:15):
we together will make this better for all of us.
Speaker 1 (26:18):
So it's a very surgical process. It is, it really is.
It's very important.
Speaker 2 (26:24):
It's so important. I tell my guys all the time,
put your shoulders back, lift your head up high. We
are protecting the environment, we're protecting homes, families, pets, especially children,
and we should feel really really super good about that.
Speaker 1 (26:38):
That is you should, you absolutely should. Yes, you know.
I talk about this a lot. We're going to be
talking about this next week as well. I believe, I believe.
Don't quote me on it. Don't get angry with me
if I can't make this happen. But our goal is
to have our annual Springtime Birds and Bees and Flowers
and Trees episode next week, in which we're talking about
(27:01):
inviting all the elements of nature that we want back
into our yards and our homes and forming habitats and
ecosystems and all of the kinds of things that a
lot of people they think about, you know, springtime. They're like, Oh,
I want to plant a garden, I want more flowers,
in my garden. We're just going to try and direct
all of that in the best possible way. Like you
(27:22):
and I were talking during the break, I had mentioned
to you that isn't it fascinating how if you want
birds in your yard, if that's the goal, it isn't
just about planting trees and putting out beautiful flowers. It's
about planting trees that are bird friendly and native plants,
because birds are in your yard looking for food, just
(27:45):
like they are also shelter and water and cover, but
they're looking for food and they're looking for bugs. Birds
are a great way of getting bugs out of your yard,
but you got to have the bugs there to begin with.
And in every region of country, every region of the world,
the insects that have evolved and adapted for that region
(28:06):
have almost virtually no use whatsoever for non native plants
and flowers, so they just won't be there. And if
they're not there, the birds want. You could have this
beautifully vert and colorful yard full of Eastern flowers and
not have a single bird in your yard because there's
just no reason for them. They're not worried about the
(28:27):
attractiveness of your yard. They're they're concerned about, you know,
how it works and how it benefits for them. So
it brings up this whole subject. This reason I'm talking
about it not only to tease you about next weekend show,
but it brings up this whole subject of displacement. It's
just something. It's something that architects and designers like myself,
(28:48):
I hope more of us think about. It's something that
you should think about. Displacement is a reality in the
natural order. It's not just about human beings taking a
patch of meadow and bulldozing it flat and building a
house there and shoving all the natural elements outside of
our walls. It happens in nature. I mean, if a
(29:11):
gopher digs a tunnel through the soil and disrupts the
surface of the soil, they are displacing other creatures, other plants,
every creature, ants to gophers, to every we all displace
other forms of nature. Now, the problem with human beings
is we get a lot of hubris behind us and
(29:34):
we ignore the natural order, and we don't displace things
in a way that works with everything. And one of
the things that I love about the way e Cola
does pest control is that you are not looking to
displace everything. You're not looking to overshoot and overreach. You're
looking for ways that human beings can safely effectively live
(29:59):
with nature and keep the pests and the threats at
bay and out and uh and we don't have to
destroy nature in order to do that. There are ways,
and I just I just love the way that you
guys approach that. So that's my little soapbox on displacement.
Speaker 2 (30:14):
It's just very interesting.
Speaker 1 (30:15):
It's a reality. It's a reality. And so anyway, okay,
so a couple of minutes left. I know you're Jones,
and to tell us all about some special things about Akola,
I'm gonna give you the you know, cart blaunch. Tell
us where where can they find you? Where? What is
your service area? How can they contact you? And what
(30:37):
is this butterfly bocks thing too?
Speaker 2 (30:39):
Okay, I'd love to tell you about that should start there, sure,
all right, Well, we love our customers, and we always
ask our customers do you know anybody else that would
love to experience what you've experienced? Because they're happy and
they'll sometimes say yes or let me think about it
or whatever. And so what we offer is when a
person defers another person, and that person decides to go
(31:03):
with us, the original person gets twenty five dollars off
their next service. So basically, we say, do you want
to know how you can get your service for free?
Because we have no limit to how many Butterfly Bucks
you can get, So every referral that you bring in,
you get twenty five dollars off your next service. So
we really love that and we love giving those out
(31:24):
because we just love referrals. It's the best form of advertising, right,
I mean, other than Dean and house Whisper. But you know,
we would just want we want to get the word out.
We really want everybody to know about it, Cola. We've
been around since nineteen eighty three, and so many times
I go to a party and someone won't know about
the company, and I'm like, how is that possible? But
(31:44):
it is possible. So we want everybody to know about
who we are and why we are, and that we're
here for you and why Butterfly.
Speaker 1 (31:51):
Butterfly is part of your Logoh yes it is. Yes.
Speaker 2 (31:56):
I was trying to come up with a way to
explain in small, you know, just a small sentence of
what we do, and so I want people to know
that we're powerful, because powerful means we can get rid
of the problem. So powerful is the word that I
came up with, because we're powerful enough to take care
of whatever it is that you need takeing care of,
as long as it's in the past road and you
(32:16):
know issue. And then the other part of it is
we do it gently. So my tagline is Powerful Termite
and Pest Control as gentle as a butterfly. And that's it,
because we want to get rid of the problem, but
we want to do it as gently as possible, and
we believe and we've proven that that's possible we can
do that, and so that's what we do. So where
(32:38):
can you find Ecola. You can find us by anywhere
from San Diego to San Luis Obispo. We have seven
offices now, which is amazing, and we are hiring. Side note,
we are hiring, so if you know somebody, they have
to have a great attitude and a clean driving record
if they're going to be on the road. The rest
we can teach and train, but we service all those
(33:01):
areas Anaheim for Orange County of San Diego. We're right
by the airport or kit up there, way up there
and then Mission Hills is our corporate headquarters. If somebody
wants to be in our call center, then it would
be the Mission Hills office. People always ask to be that,
but all our calls come into one central location and
that's where I practically live. And it's a wonderful place.
(33:23):
And we have nice trucks, wonderful people, clean, consider it polite.
Speaker 1 (33:30):
The best service technicians, and just so well trained. So
how can everybody reach you here? We are We're down
to the wire.
Speaker 2 (33:37):
Now you can give your phone number and might and
termite Lady dot com is just the easiest to remember.
For the website and the website. I've spent so much
time and money on that website because I want you
to be educated.
Speaker 1 (33:48):
It is very, very informative.
Speaker 2 (33:50):
It is somebody videos because you know, sometimes we can
over educate. So we just want you to be educated
to the level in which you need to be educated.
And we feel that if you're educated, you're gonna want
to use us as your provider.
Speaker 1 (34:06):
All right, I'm going to give out the number. This
is our special number here for everybody who's trying to
reach you Cola again. It is eight eight eight four
two two seventeen seventeen eight eight eight four two two
seventeen seventeen, and the website is very simply termite Lady
dot com termite Lady dot com. Su Freeze, thank you
(34:28):
for joining us on the program.
Speaker 2 (34:30):
Thank you so much. This has been such an experience.
You are amazing, so thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 1 (34:35):
It is a pleasure having you here, so informative. Everybody
has benefited greatly by our conversation, and for all of you,
my friends, the time has come for me to say
adieu until the next weekend where we will be uh.
I think we will be doing our Birds in the
B show. So I'm just going to leave you with
this very simple thought today. Displacement is something that we
(34:57):
have to think about. We have to think about the
fact that everything we do in life pushes another thing aside.
Maybe that's the time that you spend committing to one
project and deciding not to do another. It's all about
life choices. The quality of a life come down to
all of their simple, very special choices. And I hope
today you look forward for the rest of your afternoon
(35:20):
and the week ahead and you make the choice, the
conscious choice. You get busy building yourself a beautiful life.
We will feel right back here next weekend. This has
been Home with Dean Sharp, the House Whisper. Tune into
the live broadcast on KFI AM six forty every Saturday
morning from six to eight Pacific time, and every Sunday
(35:43):
morning from nine to noon Pacific time, or anytime on
demand on the iHeart Radio app
KFI AM six forty. You're listening to Dean Sharp The
House Whisper on demand on the iHeartRadio app. Hey, you
know that this very programmed. This one, this live broadcast
is also known as the House Whisperer podcast that you
can listen to anytime, anywhere on demand. Hundreds of episodes,
(00:23):
all searchable by topic. It is truly your home improvement
reference library. About an hour after we go off the
air today, every minute of this show, this pest control
special show with my special guest Sue Freeze from Ecola,
will be on the podcast site there for you to
listen to as often as you like, anytime you like,
(00:47):
from anywhere on demand until the end of time. Well
that may be an extreme but for a long long time.
Let's just say that much as well. Okay, so don't
out on all the episodes of the House Whisper podcast.
And if you're just tuning in and you've missed part
of today's show, then it's going to be waiting for you.
(01:07):
There you can hear the whole thing. This is the broadcast,
and then whenever you want the podcast. That's how it works.
And if you're thinking, hey, that's all great, Dean but
what I really need is you and Tina standing in
our house. Well, you can do that too. You can
book an in home design consult with me and Tea.
Just go to house whisperer dot Design for more details.
(01:29):
House Whisperer dot Design. Okay, Sue Freeze my special guest
owner operator of Ecola Ecola Eco La Pest Control. And
it's time to talk about mosquitos. And I set it
all up. I baited everybody at the end of the
last segment. Uh, mosquitos are a huge problem for everybody,
(01:51):
regardless whether you own a home, rent, doesn't matter, if
you're outside on your patio space, they're there. They want you.
They are going to get you.
Speaker 2 (02:01):
They get you whether you like it or not. So
they like it.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
And I and I mentioned that there's a lot of
there's a lot of misinformation about mosquitos out there because
there are a lot like if you were to go
on Amazon right now, I'm just saying, and I love Amazon, Okay,
nothing faulting it, but if you go on Amazon right
now and you put in mosquito, uh, you know, control
or anything like that in the search window, you're going
to get a ton of companies saying here by our
(02:25):
little you know UV light with the Zappa bug zapper. Okay,
mosquitos are not attracted to UV light sources and so
guess what. Nope, not gonna do it. But Sue has
a system, tell.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
Us you we do, and we started it. I think
it was last year. I don't think it was here before,
but maybe it was time flies.
Speaker 3 (02:46):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (02:47):
I have to say, I've been in this business for
forty six years and mosquitoes weren't as aggressive as they
are now. Have you found that to be true? For me?
It's true. So we have a product. It's called into Care.
You could go to our website and get a lot
of it education on it at termite lady dot com
and into Care as a mosquito it's a green mosquito
control system using traps that attract and kill eighties mosquitoes
(03:10):
that do carries zycha sorry ezca. It uses larva side
and a fungus to kill adult mosquitoes and prevent larval development. Now,
the effectiveness of this product reduces It reduces mosquito populations
by seventy to ninety percent in treated areas, and that's
per manufacturer studies. Now to what does it look like
(03:33):
what you know. What happens next, we come out and
normally on an average size home, if you've got a
pool or just you want to get in the backyard
and enjoy your backyard with your barbecue and all of
those things. We put two of these bait stations out
and they kind of look like speakers and again if
you can just.
Speaker 1 (03:51):
Like those, like an in ground landscaping speaker, exactly like that.
Speaker 2 (03:55):
And it's two of those normally, and then we put
you on a monthly service only during this summer season
when the mosquitoes are out and we have to put
a new bait program in it. It touches the water.
There's water inside of it.
Speaker 1 (04:08):
The oh, so that's that's what these mosquitos look.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
So they're attracted to the water. And then we put
this bait program on top of it and it leaches
down into the water and the mosquitoes come in and
they set down on their little pads you've seen them.
They sit on top of the water. They get infected
with this product. Then they fly away from there, because
you know they do that. They land and then they
fly away and they look for another source of water,
(04:32):
probably on your property and they move that product that
they got on their little pads to the next place,
like in a pond or a pool or a bird feeder.
The best thing about this and that's what kills it.
It kills the larval and it kills the adults. Takes
a little time, but they are moving this product around
(04:54):
so that it's getting more population breakdown. Also, it doesn't
affect fish, because that's the next question you were going
to ask.
Speaker 1 (05:04):
It doesn't want How did you know that? Yeah, well,
of course, yeah, I just want to make.
Speaker 2 (05:08):
Sure effect the birds. It doesn't affect your dog taking
a lick of that water. It doesn't do anything anything
except for the mosquitos, which is the target pest, and
that's what we're going after. Another thing that we do
is we fog underneath foliage. If you've got a really
extreme problem, then we would do a fogging under the foliage.
And I'm looking outside Dean's La Area here right now,
(05:29):
and I'm just like, oh, it would be amazing to
do this do this place anyway. So that's what we do,
and it is effective, and we would love to be
able to do that with you.
Speaker 1 (05:39):
So the two critical components there that we're talking about
is if there are mosquitos in your yard, number one,
we got to reduce population. And number two, we want
to get them the ones that are there, we want
to get them away from us. Yes, right, So mosquitos
zero in on carbon dioxide plumes that come out of
us because we exhale carbon dietee, so we are like
(06:01):
little we're like little cloud plumes of saying I'm over here.
But the cool thing about the into care these these
bait stations. Number one, they're super low profile and they
just kind of go away. But number two, they are
more attractive to the mosquitos than we are. Therefore, if
(06:21):
there are mosquitos in the yard, they will find it
first and then it so that it accomplishes the number
one task of getting the mosquitoes off of us. And
there are other things like that, like there are big
You can use a propane tank with a special dispersement
on the top, set it off in the corner of
your property, and it throws up a massive, massive CO
(06:46):
two plume, which of course is not great for the environment,
not great for the atmosphere. But the point is bigger
than people, and therefore the mosquitos go there instead. But
the INTWO Care system does the exact same thing without
all the co two stuff, And then while it's attracting
them away from us, it's also causing them to be
(07:06):
the carrier of their own doom, which I'm all for.
When it comes to mosquitoes, I love all sorts of nature,
but I got to say I have no love lost
between me and mosquitos whatsoever. So just like they are
so good, I mean, here's the thing. Mosquitoes are technically
the most dangerous creature on the planet. They are the
(07:29):
carriers of malaria. Mosquitoes are responsible for killing more people
every year than any than all other creatures combined together.
They are the most dangerous living thing on this planet
as far as a animal life form, because they are
such efficient carriers of zeka, malaria, dengay fev. I mean,
(07:51):
you name it. So here it is. The Into Care
system is using the efficacy of their carrying systems against them,
which I think is just the most beautiful, wonderful thing ever.
And so you're reducing populations and getting pulling mosquitoes away
from people and the covers on the Into Care system,
(08:14):
they won't allow dogs or cats or pets to get
you can't get to the water, and kids can't get
to the water. The water. That stuff doesn't bother fish,
it doesn't, you know. So it's just a really really
smart system, a very very smart system. So if you've
got a mosquito issue, you need to give a Cola
call and talk to them about it. I think it's
(08:36):
time for us to talk about rodents.
Speaker 2 (08:37):
Okay, can I tell you a story that happened to me?
Speaker 1 (08:40):
Yes, when we come back, because they're going to they're
going to start throwing cans at me if I don't
go to break. But so you have a rodent story.
Speaker 2 (08:48):
I have three?
Speaker 1 (08:49):
Oh, okay, we'll pick the best one and then we'll
go from there and we'll talk about getting rodents out
of the house. You are listening to Home a Dean
Sharp the House Whisper.
Speaker 3 (09:00):
You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on demand from
KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
Today we're talking pest control with my very special in
studio guests, Sue Freeze from Ekola Pest Control. She is
the owner and the operator one of the most innovative
pest control companies of the most innovative pest control company
and Conscientious Pest Control company that I know, which makes
it my absolute favorite pest control company in all of
(09:29):
southern California. We've talked about termites and alternative treatments for termites.
We've talked about skeeters, We've taken calls. I think it's
time for us to talk about the rats, rats and
mice and rodent. Do you have a story?
Speaker 2 (09:46):
I do have a story, and it's funny because you
know it has nothing to do with sanitation. Really it can,
but not always. And you know, there are no respectors
of anybody. They just you know, they show up and
then they reproduce every thirty days. And mice and rats,
you know, there's anywhere from eight new ones to fifteen
new ones, maybe even twenty on some cases between mice
(10:08):
and rats. And you can tell the difference between mice
and rats as far as they're poop. I know it
sounds funny, but mice usually there's pointed poop, and rats
it's usually blunt at the end. So if you're wondering
about that, because you know there are baby rats, and
you still got to know if they're a rat or
a mice. My story is is that I have a
lake house and I looked out my backyard and I
(10:28):
found a rat that was staring at me outside, and
I'm like, oh, there's a rat out there. And I
have lived I've had this house for I don't know
five years, never seen a rat before. It's right on
the lake. It's not on a barn or anything. So
I thought, uh, oh, because where there's one, there's more.
Just remember that if you see one mouse, if you
(10:50):
see one rat, there's more.
Speaker 1 (10:52):
Oh yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (10:53):
So anyway, so a couple of weeks went by and
we were getting ready to go on a trip, and
it was at night because they're nocturnal and at night,
and I was walking in all of a sudden, I
see some mallet corner of my eye in the house,
not outside the house, in the house. Can you relate?
How's this happen to you? So then I'm thinking of
now they found it found inside. A week goes by.
(11:16):
We tried to find that one. We did what we
needed to do to get rid of the one, but
we knew there were more, and so we went to
the outside look for openings. This is what we need
to do, look for openings, because they started outside and
then they're coming inside. So they got to find a
way in, and why would they want to come in?
Because they need food, they need water, and they need shelter.
That's what they need. We don't want to give it
to them, and we want to close off so that
(11:39):
they don't get in. So that's called an exclusion, and
Nicola offers exclusions. So I guess I needed an exclusion.
We went around and we found the holes. It was
a new air conditioner was put in. There was a
hole that had got magnified by everything, and so that's
how they went made their way in. So I'll just
get right to the bottom of this. Come to find
(11:59):
out out underneath my sink and you might have this too,
there is a kickplate, and underneath my sink there is
a false floor, and all my cleansers and all my
wonderful things was in there. We had to pull that out,
and then we had to pull that whole thing up
and found that there was a nest under there. They
were pulling the nesting out of my dishwasher, and I'm
(12:20):
nesting on the floor. When I woke up in the morning,
I could not find out for the life of me
what was going on. So there was a whole family
in there, and they'd been in there for quite a while,
but I never knew it. So this could be happening
to you.
Speaker 1 (12:31):
So what do you do?
Speaker 2 (12:33):
Okay, you call somebody that knows how to deal with this,
and part of it is exclusion. We do inspections, We
do exclusion, which means closing up any openings. And then
what we do is we will set traps on the
inside because if we've closed them in, they can't get out.
We've got to get them out because otherwise they're gonna
die and they're gonna smell, and you do not want that.
(12:53):
And I highly recommend not baiting these rats because you
never know where they're going to die. They could die
inside your wall. You don't want that. So that's what
we do. And then we will trap, get the things,
get the rats out of there. We've closed it up
to where they can't get in, and that's what we do.
Speaker 1 (13:09):
So you want to trap the rats that are inside
the House of the roads, you trap them because because
if you poison them by baiting, you mean poison, then
they could die anywhere anyway where we can't get.
Speaker 2 (13:20):
Right, So you got to knock out a drywall wall
or something, and that's not good.
Speaker 1 (13:24):
So, yes, I and I talk about this all the time.
When people are calling me asking me about rodent questions
and they're like, how do I get rodents out of
my yard, I'm like, I don't know. I mean, because again,
this is my point. I have yet to find any
value of going to war with the natural world. It's
(13:45):
going to win. There's just more of them than there
are you know of me, right, So I don't want
to war with the rodents around my property. I don't
want to go to war with them. I want to
find a way to a detail a date haunt like
you know, like I stay on this side of the wall,
and you stay on that side of the wall, and
(14:05):
that's on avoid. I mean, we have chickens, and if
you have chickens, you have rats. That's like the second
rule that that you why it has nothing to do
with clean leaves. The fact that I got chicken feeders
out there and they're like, hey.
Speaker 2 (14:17):
Food in the middle of the day, easy food, right,
and you know, so so.
Speaker 1 (14:21):
They're gonna be They're gonna be rodents around scurrying around
the property, and we're just like, hey, we have to
accept that they're not hurting anybody. They're they're they don't
want they're not coming at us. Okay, they're here for
other reasons, but not in the house. No, no, down boy, no,
not in the house. So exclusion is the key, right
(14:43):
to deter and exclude them from being able to come
in the house. And that means going around and finding
anything that's like half an inch, you know, gap or larger,
because they'll get in there.
Speaker 2 (14:52):
We say half an inch, you say it's a dime.
For a mouse, it's a dim, and for a rat
it's a quarter. But you're saying a half inch. So
that might be because they.
Speaker 1 (15:00):
Well, I mean a diamond. A diamond, that's a dime.
That's a half an inch. Yeah, so a half inch,
So a dime sized hole will will a mouse can
get through that, And we're like, no way. But if
you've ever seen one of those things wet now, all
that toff and fluff.
Speaker 2 (15:14):
They can their skeleton just can't.
Speaker 1 (15:16):
Yeah, they can get in there. They can make it happen.
All right, let's talk more about this on the other
side of the news.
Speaker 3 (15:22):
You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on demand from
KFI A M six forty.
Speaker 1 (15:29):
You are Home with Dean sharp the house whisper. Are
you at home? Well, you're at home with me. That's
just the way it works around here. Whether you're out
running errands, listening, whether i've I mean your ear as
you're walking the dog, or whether you're at home or
doing something anything. When you are with us here on
the program, I want you to feel at home because
(15:50):
we're talking about all things home every weekend, every Saturday
morning from six to eight Pacific time, every Sunday morning
nine to noon Pacific time. And I'm sitting here in
studio with my very very special guest, Sue Freeze, the
owner operator of Ecola Pest Control, and we've been talking
about all things pest control this morning. If you've missed
(16:12):
the show, don't don't you know, don't don't dismay and
catch us on the podcast and listen to everything that
you missed. But so far, what have we covered. We've
covered termites, all sorts of things about termites. We've talked
about mosquitoes. Now we're talking about rodents and part of it.
So we've we've got the whole okay, exclude thing down,
(16:34):
but rodents, attics, attic insulation, that's a whole Magilla in
and of itself, So let's talk about that.
Speaker 2 (16:43):
Okay. So rodents they you know, what do they do?
They poop, they pee, and usually it's in your attic.
And if you hear any p pitter pattern, you know,
need to call somebody, right because don't ignore it. It's
not going away. They're not going away.
Speaker 1 (16:57):
They're up there for a reason. They are up there
love and life.
Speaker 2 (17:00):
Yeah, they're usually nesting, but they're living up there and
they're doing things that you don't want them to do.
And when you think about see for me, with the
asthma and everything, the indoor air quality is so important
to our lives. So you don't want to have poop
go into powder form and then you turn on your air,
you turn on your heat, and then what's happening is
(17:21):
that that air and those particles are going through the
vents and everything and into your indoor air quality. So
you don't want to be breathing that. When we come
and do a roadent inspection, we're looking for that, we're
looking for the rodents. We're looking on how to exclude
the rodents from being in your house, and then we
have to clean out your attic if they've been living
(17:42):
up there, so we do that also, we clean it
all out, We sanitize it, deudorize it, get it all clean,
and then we have this program. It's called TAP Thermal
Acoustical Pest Control and it's insulation cellulo spased product treated
with boric acid to detour pests, cockroaches, ants, termites, and
(18:03):
rodents while providing thermal and sound insulation. It's marked as
eco friendly, reducing pesticide use, and that's what we use.
So it's blown in, it's treated with the boric acid,
and the effectiveness is it repels roaches and rodents by
creating an inhospitable environment. Boric acid disrupts digestion. Studies show
(18:24):
seventy to ninety percent reduction in roach populations and treated buildings.
So we've done everything. We've done the rodent inspection, the
rodent exclusion, we've trapped anything that's been caught up in there.
Then we clean out your attic and then we put
the TAP in that insulation in there and it saves
you energy. So it's got a lot of things that
(18:46):
we can do. Now if you haven't had a rodent problem,
but you still want to get better energy savings, we
can up the amount of insulation that you have in
your attic to get the maximum energy savings that you
can get. So both ways we can take care of you.
Speaker 1 (19:02):
Yeah, and now, so let me talk to about this
from the builder side of things. Okay, people call me
all the time because they know I say, insulate the attic,
reinsulate the attic. If you can't afford anything else to
get your heating and cooling bills under control, ad attic insulation,
and people are quite often surprised when they ask me
(19:23):
what's the best attic insulation, Dean. They assume I'm going
to say roll bat insulation, fiberglass bat insulation, because I
think we all have this romantic notion, probably by movies
and TV of these big, walkable, livable attic spaces up there.
So we like the idea that it's all neat and
clean and and it won't be itchy or anything like that.
(19:46):
And you know, if you have a giant pitched roof
and you can afford to spend time in your attic,
you know I'm not going to be the one to
stop you from doing that. But the point is this
bat style insulation, the stuff that come in rolls is
the least effective form of insulation in an attic. And
(20:06):
the reason is you have all of this heat and
or cool moving in between the attic space and the
floor below. We want a solid blanket, and a bad insulation.
Number one only fits in between the wood joists, the
ceiling joist stuff there. It doesn't cover the joists themselves,
so that every piece of wood then becomes a leak
(20:28):
in the attic. That's number one. Number two is that
it's easily compressible. So easily compressible, and you can't compress
insulation and maintain it's our value, and so bad insulation
usually doesn't get cut neatly around recess canlights or anything
else like that. So I always tell people blown in insulation,
(20:50):
And my favorite kind of blown in insulation is blown
in cellulose insulation because of the borates. And now you
said boric acid, And I know why you said it,
because that's the thing that ultimately repels and messes with
all the bugs and the rodents up there. They don't
like it at all. A lot of people would think, oh,
(21:12):
you know, the cool thing about cellulose insulation treated with
borates is that as a human being, we can handle it.
And it doesn't leave you with itchy skin. It doesn't.
You can get up there and it doesn't leave you.
Why because it's not fiberglass. There aren't shards of glass
being shoved into your skin on a microscopic level. And
you would think, well, the rats wouldn't like the fiberglass.
(21:33):
Oh no, they love it. They love fiberglass. That's why
they're in your net attic nesting because they love that stuff.
But they don't love the borates. And just to give
a little perspective on borates, boric acid comes from borates,
and borate is a mineral. You guys remember boraxo, that
(21:55):
soap that you know, that gritty kind of soap. Yeah,
it's it's it's a it's a mineral that is that
is naturally occurring. And it also helps in to cut
down on mildew and water retention and insulation. So it
literally is the best kind of insulation in my opinion,
(22:15):
because it serves all of these other purposes. A big
thick blanket blown across you can increase the R value
as much as you want in your attic and keep
your attic minimally you know, insect and rodent friendly.
Speaker 2 (22:30):
It's also fire retarded. Yes, yes, so it's got a
lot of added benefits.
Speaker 1 (22:35):
It really is. And so that's the insulation you guys
use when you do out do a cleanout. And that's
just great, great stuff.
Speaker 3 (22:43):
All right, you're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on
Demand from KFI A M six forty.
Speaker 1 (22:53):
We are here sitting in studio with my very special guest,
Sue Freeze from E Cola Pest Control, my very favorite,
my top referral. So many of you ask me, Dean,
can you refer me to this and this? And you know,
there are certain there are certain services, certain companies that
are fantastic that I would love to refer to everybody,
(23:17):
but they're very localized, and you know, quite often building
is a very localized game. And so some of my
favorite contractors, some of my favorite service providers, you know,
I can only refer them to you if you live
within you know, fifteen miles or so, you know, because
most of things having to do with homes tend to
be very very small businesses on the big scale of things.
(23:40):
But there are other service providers who have proven themselves
to be so excellent and have a very wide coverage
and service range. Ecola Pest Control is one of those companies.
So they are in that very very special category where
wherever you live in southern California, if you are going
to add, ask me who is the past control company
(24:03):
that should come out to my home. I'm just telling
you right now you got to call Ecola Eco La
call the termite lady. We have been talking all morning
about all forms. During the break, Sue, you and I
were talking about ants. I asked you about ants and
you said that it's a very kind of targeted approach
to ants, that you don't just come out and do
(24:24):
the nuclear blast, but that you kind of hunt down
the colony, find the line, find the colony and so on,
which is brilliant. And again that's why I love you guys,
because you're so conscious you want to just do enough
and not too much. But that led to you said
that you practice IPM, and I want you to explain
(24:46):
IPM to everybody.
Speaker 2 (24:47):
Integrated Pest Management. It's where we identify the bug because
we're the experts. We identify the past, and then we
know where they live. You know what they like, what
they dislike, and we follow it back to the colony
because what we need to do is get to the colony.
We don't need to do a blast, We don't need
to power spread the whole backyard or the whole front
yard anymore. So we just look for where they are
(25:09):
and we take care of it right there, so it's
less invasive for the homeowner and animals and everything else
for that matter. So that's what integrated past management is.
Speaker 1 (25:20):
Would you say that if a homeowner is going to
attempted to kind of diy their own pest control, that
they're going to do too little or too much.
Speaker 2 (25:31):
Usually what they do is they'll go someplace and they'll
get the product, and if they followed the directions, it
would say one cup or one whatever. But what happens,
and I've heard it from many people that do this
themselves when I'm at a party or wherever, and they say, oh,
one glug's good, two glugs is better, And so they're
putting twice as much product as they need to put
(25:54):
on there to get rid of the problem. Plus they
don't know what we know as far as where to
place it, what to do. So we look for, you know,
like there's certain things where we have to cut back
something or we have to get rid of this source
or we have to do this or that. So when
we know all of that, we together with the customer, you, homeowner,
(26:15):
we together will make this better for all of us.
Speaker 1 (26:18):
So it's a very surgical process. It is, it really is.
It's very important.
Speaker 2 (26:24):
It's so important. I tell my guys all the time,
put your shoulders back, lift your head up high. We
are protecting the environment, we're protecting homes, families, pets, especially children,
and we should feel really really super good about that.
Speaker 1 (26:38):
That is you should, you absolutely should. Yes, you know.
I talk about this a lot. We're going to be
talking about this next week as well. I believe, I believe.
Don't quote me on it. Don't get angry with me
if I can't make this happen. But our goal is
to have our annual Springtime Birds and Bees and Flowers
and Trees episode next week, in which we're talking about
(27:01):
inviting all the elements of nature that we want back
into our yards and our homes and forming habitats and
ecosystems and all of the kinds of things that a
lot of people they think about, you know, springtime. They're like, Oh,
I want to plant a garden, I want more flowers,
in my garden. We're just going to try and direct
all of that in the best possible way. Like you
(27:22):
and I were talking during the break, I had mentioned
to you that isn't it fascinating how if you want
birds in your yard, if that's the goal, it isn't
just about planting trees and putting out beautiful flowers. It's
about planting trees that are bird friendly and native plants,
because birds are in your yard looking for food, just
(27:45):
like they are also shelter and water and cover, but
they're looking for food and they're looking for bugs. Birds
are a great way of getting bugs out of your yard,
but you got to have the bugs there to begin with.
And in every region of country, every region of the world,
the insects that have evolved and adapted for that region
(28:06):
have almost virtually no use whatsoever for non native plants
and flowers, so they just won't be there. And if
they're not there, the birds want. You could have this
beautifully vert and colorful yard full of Eastern flowers and
not have a single bird in your yard because there's
just no reason for them. They're not worried about the
(28:27):
attractiveness of your yard. They're they're concerned about, you know,
how it works and how it benefits for them. So
it brings up this whole subject. This reason I'm talking
about it not only to tease you about next weekend show,
but it brings up this whole subject of displacement. It's
just something. It's something that architects and designers like myself,
(28:48):
I hope more of us think about. It's something that
you should think about. Displacement is a reality in the
natural order. It's not just about human beings taking a
patch of meadow and bulldozing it flat and building a
house there and shoving all the natural elements outside of
our walls. It happens in nature. I mean, if a
(29:11):
gopher digs a tunnel through the soil and disrupts the
surface of the soil, they are displacing other creatures, other plants,
every creature, ants to gophers, to every we all displace
other forms of nature. Now, the problem with human beings
is we get a lot of hubris behind us and
(29:34):
we ignore the natural order, and we don't displace things
in a way that works with everything. And one of
the things that I love about the way e Cola
does pest control is that you are not looking to
displace everything. You're not looking to overshoot and overreach. You're
looking for ways that human beings can safely effectively live
(29:59):
with nature and keep the pests and the threats at
bay and out and uh and we don't have to
destroy nature in order to do that. There are ways,
and I just I just love the way that you
guys approach that. So that's my little soapbox on displacement.
Speaker 2 (30:14):
It's just very interesting.
Speaker 1 (30:15):
It's a reality. It's a reality. And so anyway, okay,
so a couple of minutes left. I know you're Jones,
and to tell us all about some special things about Akola,
I'm gonna give you the you know, cart blaunch. Tell
us where where can they find you? Where? What is
your service area? How can they contact you? And what
(30:37):
is this butterfly bocks thing too?
Speaker 2 (30:39):
Okay, I'd love to tell you about that should start there, sure,
all right, Well, we love our customers, and we always
ask our customers do you know anybody else that would
love to experience what you've experienced? Because they're happy and
they'll sometimes say yes or let me think about it
or whatever. And so what we offer is when a
person defers another person, and that person decides to go
(31:03):
with us, the original person gets twenty five dollars off
their next service. So basically, we say, do you want
to know how you can get your service for free?
Because we have no limit to how many Butterfly Bucks
you can get, So every referral that you bring in,
you get twenty five dollars off your next service. So
we really love that and we love giving those out
(31:24):
because we just love referrals. It's the best form of advertising, right,
I mean, other than Dean and house Whisper. But you know,
we would just want we want to get the word out.
We really want everybody to know about it, Cola. We've
been around since nineteen eighty three, and so many times
I go to a party and someone won't know about
the company, and I'm like, how is that possible? But
(31:44):
it is possible. So we want everybody to know about
who we are and why we are, and that we're
here for you and why Butterfly.
Speaker 1 (31:51):
Butterfly is part of your Logoh yes it is. Yes.
Speaker 2 (31:56):
I was trying to come up with a way to
explain in small, you know, just a small sentence of
what we do, and so I want people to know
that we're powerful, because powerful means we can get rid
of the problem. So powerful is the word that I
came up with, because we're powerful enough to take care
of whatever it is that you need takeing care of,
as long as it's in the past road and you
(32:16):
know issue. And then the other part of it is
we do it gently. So my tagline is Powerful Termite
and Pest Control as gentle as a butterfly. And that's it,
because we want to get rid of the problem, but
we want to do it as gently as possible, and
we believe and we've proven that that's possible we can
do that, and so that's what we do. So where
(32:38):
can you find Ecola. You can find us by anywhere
from San Diego to San Luis Obispo. We have seven
offices now, which is amazing, and we are hiring. Side note,
we are hiring, so if you know somebody, they have
to have a great attitude and a clean driving record
if they're going to be on the road. The rest
we can teach and train, but we service all those
(33:01):
areas Anaheim for Orange County of San Diego. We're right
by the airport or kit up there, way up there
and then Mission Hills is our corporate headquarters. If somebody
wants to be in our call center, then it would
be the Mission Hills office. People always ask to be that,
but all our calls come into one central location and
that's where I practically live. And it's a wonderful place.
(33:23):
And we have nice trucks, wonderful people, clean, consider it polite.
Speaker 1 (33:30):
The best service technicians, and just so well trained. So
how can everybody reach you here? We are We're down
to the wire.
Speaker 2 (33:37):
Now you can give your phone number and might and
termite Lady dot com is just the easiest to remember.
For the website and the website. I've spent so much
time and money on that website because I want you
to be educated.
Speaker 1 (33:48):
It is very, very informative.
Speaker 2 (33:50):
It is somebody videos because you know, sometimes we can
over educate. So we just want you to be educated
to the level in which you need to be educated.
And we feel that if you're educated, you're gonna want
to use us as your provider.
Speaker 1 (34:06):
All right, I'm going to give out the number. This
is our special number here for everybody who's trying to
reach you Cola again. It is eight eight eight four
two two seventeen seventeen eight eight eight four two two
seventeen seventeen, and the website is very simply termite Lady
dot com termite Lady dot com. Su Freeze, thank you
(34:28):
for joining us on the program.
Speaker 2 (34:30):
Thank you so much. This has been such an experience.
You are amazing, so thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 1 (34:35):
It is a pleasure having you here, so informative. Everybody
has benefited greatly by our conversation, and for all of you,
my friends, the time has come for me to say
adieu until the next weekend where we will be uh.
I think we will be doing our Birds in the
B show. So I'm just going to leave you with
this very simple thought today. Displacement is something that we
(34:57):
have to think about. We have to think about the
fact that everything we do in life pushes another thing aside.
Maybe that's the time that you spend committing to one
project and deciding not to do another. It's all about
life choices. The quality of a life come down to
all of their simple, very special choices. And I hope
today you look forward for the rest of your afternoon
(35:20):
and the week ahead and you make the choice, the
conscious choice. You get busy building yourself a beautiful life.
We will feel right back here next weekend. This has
been Home with Dean Sharp, the House Whisper. Tune into
the live broadcast on KFI AM six forty every Saturday
morning from six to eight Pacific time, and every Sunday
(35:43):
morning from nine to noon Pacific time, or anytime on
demand on the iHeart Radio app
Home with Dean Sharp News
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