Rodents, Bugs, and Fungi

We have them all, isn't it lovely? Sometimes I hate owning a home because of the upkeep costs and I just read an article where a guy claims that renting vs. buying will make you richer. Go Figure.

Anyhow, back to the rodents, bugs, and fungi..

Rodents, we've always had rodents. In the first year here we got 13 rats, next year 7, and then 3. Since then we've been able to keep them out of the attic but I still see them outside on occasion and I know they like the garage (accessible only from outside). We also have gophers and squirrels that eat anything I try to grow and bunnies that love the grass.

Bugs, we have the normal spiders and ants, no biggie, but then we also have these tiny annoying beetles, which R says he's sick of. I have no idea where they come from or what they want but I find them everywhere and they're yucky. Oh and I just noticed that they fly. They are most annoying because I don't know how to get rid of them. And the worst bug...termites. We have them and who knows how much damage they have done to our home. I try not to worry about them because R is suppose to drill holes in the wall were their "kick out" holes are and spray some foam stuff in there. Lets hope it works. We have seen one inside the house, but apparently nothing like the swarm that entered R's boss' house.

And finally my favorite (only because I can't see or smell the termites), fungi! Yes, we have mold in our garage. We've actually been dealing with moisture on and off in our garage for a few years now. It rained a lot a few years back and the ground got so over saturated that it came in through the concrete. To the point we had to sweep it out. We thought it was caused by a plant right behind the garage and tore it out, but that didn't help. Finally when it dried out the water was gone and we've been left with efflorescence, but until recently, no more water. Then a few weeks ago I started to notice a musty smell in the garage. R thought he found the problem and we moved on, not so. When he moved his truck he found the mold. It's on things like the highchair so I assumed it was because it had been so humid and there has been very little fresh air in there, and I figured it was just surface mold . It might still be just surface mold, but one day when I was down there I found water in the garage and figured it must be from the sprinklers because they had just been on, sure enough since turning them off, no more water. Now that the yard is dead we just have to figure out which sprinkler(s) we need to fix, decided if we need a drain along that wall, and do some mold cleanup and hopefully we'll be past this.