Scary Pest Facts – Happy Halloween!

According to History, Halloween is a time of celebration and superstition.  It is believed to have originated with the ancient Celtic festival of Samhain, when people would light bonfires and wear costumes to ward off roaming ghosts.

While this may not be occurring any longer, Halloween is still a day that is known for dressing up in spooky costumes and giving everyone around you a good fright!  So in honor of Halloween, we wanted to share a few creepy facts about pests that in our opinion, can be pretty scary!

Did you know…

• Cockroaches can live seven days without a head?
• The preying mantis is known to eat others of its own kind?  The most frightening example of this is the adult female, who sometimes eats her mate just after – or even during – mating!
• Bed bugs are notorious hitchhikers?  These pests will hitch a ride in your luggage after a hotel stay, which means you could potentially bring them home with you.
• The total weight of all the termites in the world outweighs all the humans in the world?
• Black widow spiders puncture their insect prey with their fangs and administer digestive enzymes to the corpses?  By using these enzymes, and their gnashing fangs, the spiders liquefy their prey’s bodies and suck up the resulting fluid.
• Scorpions can lower their metabolism when they are unable to find food and can survive on one insect a year if necessary?  However, they do have the ability to spring quickly to the hunt when the opportunity presents itself – a gift that many hibernating species lack.
• The world’s largest rat ever recorded lived just a few thousands years ago and was the size of a house cat?  The estimated weight of the largest rat is 13.2 pounds!  For reference, a house rat typically weighs around 5 ounces.

Have a frightfully good time this Halloween!