Pest control in Riverside, CA

Riverside's hot season lasts from June 24 until September 23, the average daily high sits above 89 degrees across it, and August tops out at an average high of 94. The wetter season opens November 26 and closes April 2, and February brings the most rain at 2.6 inches. The city sits in a semi-arid climate where most of the rain falls between November and April. That gives Riverside two Argentine ant pushes a year, one in the August heat and a second after the first winter storms, because UC IPM notes they trail indoors in hot dry weather and after rain. Through the long dry summer the irrigation that keeps lawns and citrus alive keeps the mulch beds damp, which is the shelter earwigs look for. Widow numbers rise through the warm months, with the brown ones outside on patio furniture, fences, play structures and eaves and the black ones in the garages and wood piles. Mosquitoes breed in standing water, and in a dry inland city that water is the irrigation runoff, the birdbath, the clogged gutter and the plant saucer. Roof rats have the old citrus and mature trees to work with all year.

Riverside is the birthplace of the California citrus industry. The city was founded in the early 1870s, the first orange trees went in the ground in 1871, and the industry proper began soon after, when Eliza Tibbets received navel orange trees from the USDA. One of her original trees, the Parent Navel Orange Tree, is still alive in the city. The Mission Inn downtown is the largest Mission Revival building in the country, Riverside is the county seat of Riverside County, and the 2020 census counted 314,998 residents. The city takes its name from the Santa Ana River, and Mount Rubidoux stands beside the river on the west side. Three freeways, Interstate 215, State Route 60 and State Route 91, meet at a multi-level interchange in the northeast of the city near UC Riverside. Box Springs Mountain rises to 3,083 feet east of downtown and forms part of the border with Moreno Valley, and the county's Box Springs Mountain Reserve, dedicated in 1975 and now about 3,400 acres, is home to mule deer, bobcats and mountain lions. Sycamore Canyon Wilderness Park is a 1,500 acre city park and one of eight core reserves for the Stephens' kangaroo rat, a federally listed species. Fairmount Park, at the entrance from the 60, was laid out by the firm Frederick Law Olmsted founded and has a stocked pond. Old citrus groves, mature trees, a river, a stocked pond and thousands of acres of wild hillside in and around the city add up to a lot of habitat for the pests UC IPM lists for Southern California homes.

Riverside has 28 designated neighbourhoods and they don't all have the same pest problems. The Wood Streets, just off Downtown, were built almost entirely before the Second World War, with a 1920s character, a rigid street grid, narrow streets and the Tequesquite Arroyo along the northern edge. Homes of that age have mature trees, old vines and plenty of gaps. UC IPM notes that roof rats live high in trees and vines and travel along fences and utility lines, so an arroyo next door gives them cover. Older wood framing is also where a termite inspection earns its keep, since drywood and subterranean termites are both present in Southern California. Canyon Crest, one of the largest and most diverse neighbourhoods in the city, is hilly and sits close to the Box Springs Mountains, with the Sycamore Highlands section backing onto Sycamore Canyon Park and Andulka Park's 30 acres of fields and courts. Homes along that much open space have the fence lines and trees rats travel, and the block walls, wood piles and garages where black widows settle. Orangecrest, in the far southeast of the city, was citrus until the early 1980s and was master planned after a 1986 annexation, with Orange Terrace Community Park at its centre, Mission Grove to the north and unincorporated Woodcrest to the south and west. It's newer tract housing, block walls and drip lines and bark mulch, which is where ant trails head for the kitchen in the summer heat and earwigs breed in the damp beds. Arlington and La Sierra on the west side, the Eastside, Victoria and Downtown round out the neighbourhoods we cover.

Riverside is on our list of 20 cities, all served from 29990 Technology Dr Ste 13 in Murrieta. Jared Brown has put 27 years into pest control and worked every position in the industry on the way, and every technician who comes to a Riverside home is licensed through the State of California. Whichever plan you pick, monthly, every other month or quarterly, your technician deals with what you called about, and the eaves are brushed and the cobwebs cleared on the same visit. You'll be told when kids and pets can go back on the treated areas. Dylan Reed does the rodent trapping and the termite treatment, Tyler Williams does the termite inspections and Wood Destroying Organism reports, and the general pest team handles the ants, spiders, earwigs and wasps. Call (951) 535-4220 Monday to Saturday 8am to 6pm, tell Jenni Lara what you're seeing and which neighbourhood you're in, and she'll book the earliest slot that fits.