We sit down with Craig Williams, CEO & Founder of Termisave and Owner at Excalibur Pest Control out of Conroe Texas. We dive into what you should be looking for with Termites and other pests. There are so many issues with Pests and we talk about how people using products wrong is getting them banned and will be soon taken off the market. We dive into all things pest control on this Episode of Around the House. Craig is also one of the co-hosts of "The Homeowners Show" podcast.

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Mentioned in this episode:

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[00:00:05] Craig Williams: when people start talking about natural products, like have you, have you been on any, like these crunchy mom groups or anything like that? Uh, no. I try to stay away from those don't play. They're interesting. I mean, like, I, I kind of like to see like, you know, what they're claiming works.

[00:00:37] Craig Williams: Yeah. So like, if you get any kind of oil on 'em, it's basically a suffocate them. And so like, you know, you're, you're getting that dopamine hit of effectiveness. Like I put oil on the bug. And when it comes to remodeling and renovating your home, there is a lot to know the, we got you covered. This is

[00:00:55] Eric Goranson: Welcome to the Round the House Show where we help you get the most outta your home through information and [00:01:00] education. Thanks for joining us today. Well, you know something, I've talked about pest control in the past, but it's been something that's been hyper local to where I'm located here in Portland.

[00:01:21] Craig Williams: Man, thank you so much for having me. It's a, it's been a, it's been a, a dream of mine to come on the show, so I'm, I'm excited to Deep

[00:01:36] Eric Goranson: It's been, we've been overdue to do this and I was like, all right, we're gonna start out 2023, so we're gonna get that, make that happen cuz it's should have happened a while. But you know, it's one of the things that, pest control is a big deal and across the country there are all these different things that people fight.

[00:02:12] Eric Goranson: And

[00:02:18] Eric Goranson: waddle man, when they get big. Yeah, those things are huge. But you know what, that, that's the thing is termites are such a big thing across the country in most areas, and it's one of the least in our areas, you know, one of the least threatening things compared to all the others.

[00:02:36] Craig Williams: No, no term. I mean, uh, you know, the, the, the big number that everyone always throws out with termites is like annually they do about $5 billion worth of damage to people's homes and property. Um, and you know, it, it can happen, it can really happen at any time. You know, it's, it's December down here in Texas, and so, which usually means that there's not gonna be as much traumatic activity, but I, I just came from one yesterday where they had eaten the [00:03:00] entire wall of a room.

[00:03:21] Craig Williams: Well, come to find out, that's where the termites were coming in and they just, there was a leak in the ceiling mm-hmm. . And so they just followed the water up the wall and then started working their way across the, uh, the cross beams at the top. Um, and, and so like, you know, it sucks for them because those guys have been in there eating for, for two years.

[00:03:46] Eric Goranson: I, I'll get the, I had some, uh, old carpenter, an damage in my house and I'd opened up, uh, doing my kitchen remodel, opened up some drywall, and I'm like, oh, there's a lot of sawdust up here

[00:03:56] Craig Williams: Is that the pictures you sent me? Yeah, that was [00:04:00] from like

[00:04:02] Craig Williams: wow, that's cool. Which, I mean, the, the weird thing about that man is I was, I was doing a little bit of research cuz like I, I know that you're, you know, kind of up in the Pacific Northwest and we're talking to people across the US the number one pest in the United States.

[00:04:36] Craig Williams: Yeah. Now

[00:04:45] Craig Williams: do you guys have the big black ones? We have the big black ones. So they're around here. There's two kinds, and I think this is true most, most of the Southern United States is there's the big black Carpent rats, which is just the standard carpenter rant.

[00:05:06] Eric Goranson: leisure suits and hats and . Oh, sorry,

[00:05:17] Craig Williams: Okay. And, and, and they can do, they can do just as much damage. Uh, their colonies tend to be a little bit smaller than those big black ones. Mm-hmm. . Um, I love finding those big black ones, man. When you find the honey hole on those and you flush 'em out, it scares the, but Jesus outta

[00:05:39] Eric Goranson: Mm-hmm. , you can have a tree out there that's not even on your property. This is where they're coming from and they've set up the secondary kind of nests inside your house. Yeah. And you can get it outta the house, but they're still trying to get back in.

[00:05:57] Craig Williams: They're like, what can you spray to get rid of them? And [00:06:00] like that you're asking me the wrong question. Yeah. What we need to figure out is why they're there. Yep. Because if you, if you can solve the environmental issue, then you can get rid of the ant. Like if, because a answer dumb, I mean, like, if you, if you spray chemicals down, they will make a highway of dead ants to, to get to what it is that they wanna get to.

[00:06:36] Craig Williams: It's like if we can solve that, you don't really need the chemical mo Most of the time it's moisture. Yeah. So

[00:06:56] Eric Goranson: But it looked like it was an area that maybe was damp wood when they were first [00:07:00] framing it or something. Mm-hmm. that was, that's one time that I'm like, I don't know how water got anywhere near it cuz there's not a roof over it. Or that's close. There's not a, you know what I mean? It had to have been something that was uh, you know, maybe a pre infected wood or something at some point.

[00:07:22] Eric Goranson: Yeah. Well anything here, everything here in the Pacific Northwest, we get rain this time of year.

[00:07:49] Eric Goranson: They sh you know, house wrap it, get it going. I mean it's, and there's not much drying. And then you got an environmental hazard there and that's prime category four, I

[00:08:05] Craig Williams: They just want to move. Yeah. Is that what's going on?

[00:08:26] Eric Goranson: When the, when the sheeting has got its own barrier on the outside, it just keeps it, you know, keeps the house dryer, which means it's better off on the inside. You don't have as much of that moisture intrusion.

[00:08:43] Craig Williams: I mean, like, there's, there's a huge market, uh, there's like a, I forget the name, I think it was called Dber Stopper. This, this new product that I stole mm-hmm. . And it, it, it's just a cover for your drain lines on your home. Cool. To keep mud dabbers from getting inside, which I mean, like, it's, it's, it's cool.

[00:09:11] Eric Goranson: plug up that, like that

[00:09:20] Craig Williams: Like there's, there's gonna be entry points. Um, and, and so like, do I wanna spend a hundred dollars on a product that covers a pipe when I can just stick a stick up in it from time to time and knock the mud loose? Yeah. Yeah.

[00:09:41] Eric Goranson: Right.

[00:09:48] Eric Goranson: Absolutely. Absolutely. . So what are the Okay. You know, I'm not experienced with termites, cuz I'll be honest, I have not seen in the Pacific Northwest west here in my boy [00:10:00] 30 years. Mm-hmm. , I've think I've seen one tented residence in 30 years.

[00:10:09] Craig Williams: doesn't happen here. Well, and, and so there's, there's probably a good reason for that, uh, tenting one, it's really expensive and it's really dangerous. Um, you know, the, the reason you tent is because you don't want that stuff to escape and get out because I mean, like, they're using the kinds of chemicals that when you smell, by the time you smell them, it's too late.

[00:10:51] Craig Williams: Okay. Um, and I, I think one of the reasons that we're starting to see a little bit of a resurgence in, in some of the termite [00:11:00] talk, and it like, not that it ever went away, but you still have guys today talking about chlorine, um, , which was a product that was banned like almost two decades ago. I was gonna say 20 something years ago.

[00:11:30] Craig Williams: Yep. Um, if we're being honest, um, yeah. Which means that we're kind of coming up on the tail end of the efficacy of that product. For, for a lot of properties. And so you're gonna start seeing some properties that haven't had issues in years, start to have them. Yeah. Um, because they've been able to ward it off with that residual.

[00:11:57] Craig Williams: the house. They're fixing to do the same thing with Rod genocides. I mean, we're [00:12:00] getting, we're getting news down the pipeline that we're about to lose a lot of our really good products with Rod Genocides.

[00:12:12] Eric Goranson: it's funny and sorry, public and all of our listeners out there, and. That's where things tend to go sideways is that you get people out there, you know, most of the professionals know they're licensed.

[00:12:37] Craig Williams: Yeah. And they'll, I mean, you know, they don't care if they poison the neighbor's cat.

[00:12:41] Eric Goranson: lake the, the lake house that they're on or whatever. Yeah.

[00:12:59] Craig Williams: So anyway, [00:13:00] that aside, we have good products now. I mean, like the best liquid one out there is probably Tomado, but I mean, they will only warranty it for 10 years. Um, okay. And that's still like, and in a long time though. It, it, it is a long time. But they, it's a numbers game, right? Yeah. So for my, my customers down here and I'm, I'm in the Houston area.

[00:13:42] Craig Williams: Right? So the likely, like the numbers are actually on your side. Right. Unless you have like a really heavy, conducive condition, like a leak mm-hmm. or something like that, the likelihood that you're going to get them is pretty low. Yeah. You know, I mean, it's, it's a one in 20 [00:14:00] chance and that rarely happens over the course of home ownership.

[00:14:11] Eric Goranson: all right. So is there a, if you can, uh, you know, most likely scenario, is it somebody that has a, you know, let's get into house construction if they have a basement versus a crawlspace versus like slab on grade.

[00:14:30] Craig Williams: your turn. It is a roll The dice. It's your turn situation. Um, okay. Now I will, I will say, um, the likelihood of you getting damage from termites based off of your, the, the structure type is different.

[00:15:00] Craig Williams: No. Um, so I mean, I, if you get them and they're on one of those, the likelihood that they have time to establish and actually do some damage is pretty high. Um, sure. So, so that once, once to get going, there's nobody there to stop 'em e Exactly, yeah. And there's, there's really not much you can do. I mean, like those, those kind of jobs, uh, are very time consuming.

[00:15:42] Craig Williams: And so mo a lot of people will just end up walking away from it. Yeah. Does that mean it'll, it'll cost. See, you're, it'll cost twice as much to do that. Then it will a traditional slab.

[00:16:00] Eric Goranson: Oh, yeah. On, on crawlspaces. We've got a lot of those. And I think it was just because they were trying to build so many homes fast. Okay. And that lumber was so prevalent that you could go and do, what they would do is they'd do that pier and beam, so they'd have like four foot in between the beams, then they'd put two by six car decking down, you know, at a diagonal mm-hmm.

[00:16:23] Craig Williams: And yeah, it's, it's a great way to build a house, don't get me wrong. Yeah. I mean, like, it's, but it,

[00:16:31] Craig Williams: No, no. Nobody wants to go underneath there. . I mean, not, not even plumbers. I mean, like, and that's, that's kind of what they do.

[00:16:44] Eric Goranson: It's beautiful. So H V A C, all of it is so much easier to do. Yeah.

[00:16:57] Craig Williams: I

[00:17:00] Craig Williams: is it? No. And like the, the few people that I've found that have them have had them built after the fact, and they're mostly wine sellers. Gotcha. .

[00:17:18] Craig Williams: Yeah. People, people that have been moving here, that have been buying houses, they're like, where's the basement? They're like, we don't, we don't do that here. Yeah. They're like, well, where do you keep your stuff? It's like, like, well, we don't park houses. Well everyone here. It's like no one parks their cars in the garage.

[00:17:42] Eric Goranson: Interesting. Yeah. That's, uh, That's wild. We've got another pasture that we have. We have these, um, boring beetles that'll come through and, and, uh, create a, a light sawdust too as well that we'll get into, uh, into, uh, the wood here that tends to go into the older dry wood.

[00:18:11] Craig Williams: Yeah. And that, that is where you'll see those, and there's, there's different kinds.

[00:18:34] Craig Williams: Yep. Um, and then they bring it inside and the air condition, and all of a sudden the, you know, the beetles start feeling good and they start hatching out and all of a sudden they've got a real problem and they're getting into, you know, Grandma's, uh, I dunno, I don't even like old, you know?

[00:18:51] Craig Williams: Yeah.

[00:18:58] Eric Goranson: oh my gosh. That's, [00:19:00] that's, that's a guilty one on, on a lot of different reasons, but Yes. Yeah,

[00:19:17] Craig Williams: Yeah. So that, that doesn't happen. But if you're, you know, rolling out into Kentucky and finding some old barn and just taking it apart and then bringing it in and building a wall in your house, good luck.

[00:19:37] Eric Goranson: So they would take all of their, Wood. First thing they'd do is they'd grate it, make sure it was usable, they'd send it down and, and get a kiln dried, which would kill everything inside of that. Cuz you're just baking the snot out of that thing.

[00:19:53] Craig Williams: But yeah, I mean, you have to get it really hot. Yeah. Um, I, and you know, if you, if you ever go to a hotel, you'll see [00:20:00] guys rolling through rooms with heat machines. Um, now they're not, they're not using pesticides as much, especially for the, you know, like when, when the bedbugs were so big for a while. Yeah.

[00:20:10] Eric Goranson: they're still bed, they're just not reporting on '

[00:20:13] Craig Williams: Well, no, I mean, most, most big hotels have a maintenance program now and, um, ah, okay. And, and so what they'll do is they'll just, they'll kind of shut down a room for a day. They'll go in and heat treat it. Um, gotcha. And it's, it's so much easier to do in a hotel because there's not a whole lot in there that can melt, you know?

[00:20:41] Eric Goranson: you got pictures and everything

[00:20:44] Craig Williams: Right. Hotel, eh, you know, not much to move out. Pull the electronics out of it and go, right. Yeah. And you're good to go. You know? And you can, you could probably knock out, you know, six to 10 rooms in a day if you're really moving. So, I mean, like, they, they, they've just made it part of their [00:21:00] good hotels have made it part of their maintenance, I'll put it that way.

[00:21:04] Eric Goranson: Yeah, that was a, that was a huge problem there for a while. It seemed, I don't know if people had just gotten off from doing it, but it was all over the news. People were having serious bedbug infestations and it seemed like people that were traveling would get it. Mm-hmm. and then taken to the next hotel

[00:21:20] Craig Williams: Well, yeah, and we, and it was, it was a problem because like we knew what the best treatment was, which was heat. Yeah. But the equipment, the, the equipment had just gotten outta hand. Like it was, I think, I think at the time it was somewhere between 10 and $12,000 just for like a single piece of equipment.

[00:21:54] Craig Williams: True. So,

[00:22:02] Craig Williams: Yep. Yeah. And that's true, like, as, as people do more and more work, they sell more and more equipment so the equipment gets cheaper, you know,

[00:22:10] Craig Williams: cheaper.

[00:22:14] Eric Goranson: It can be when you're trying to get into that specialty stuff. That's for sure. That's for sure. Well, yeah, that makes sense. And you know, that's, and that's one of those things too, and I wanted to talk too, and we'll go back to termites here in a second, but Sure.

[00:22:44] Craig Williams: everywhere. Well, I mean, uh, GERD, your loins, man. I mean, I'm not kidding because they are, they are taking away some of the best products that you guys have to deal with this kind of stuff.

[00:23:16] Craig Williams: like if you, and, and it always start, and this is, this is just kind of the rule in our industry. It always starts on the west coast and then just moves its way across the us It's like West coast and then northeast, and then it just kind of converges on Texas. Um, and, and so that's, they've, they've already banned a lot of them in, in California.

[00:23:55] Craig Williams: Yeah. Not, not cuz that's what I do. But you know [00:24:00] what, what goes on in my state is completely different than the regulations in your state in all 50 states because I can't do business in any other state except for Texas, unless I'm licensed in that state. Each state has their own rules and regulations when it comes to this kind of stuff.

[00:24:30] Craig Williams: Now their guys have to be licensed in your area, but they're operating off a whole different set of rules and regulations that they have to follow, which in some instances really hamstrings them from, from what they're able to do. Um,

[00:24:46] Eric Goranson: Uh, that was that. And a lot of these big name companies that are the chains that are the franchises around there, they walk in and they go, okay, well I got four boxes to check. Mm-hmm. to do. We can do plan A, plan B, [00:25:00] plan C, or plan D even though those aren't really great for my area. That's what they're gonna try to pitch you every time where your local people are like, Hey, I know it works for this, we gotta go this direction.

[00:25:19] Craig Williams: Of PE control and they want you on, you're not getting the custom burger and they want you on the contract. Yep. Other than that, they, I mean, like, they legit don't care.

[00:25:40] Eric Goranson: like, like with carpenter ants, that there's a lot, they're starting to use a lot less pesticides with that kind of stuff, where they've got things that kind of more naturally fight them than they did maybe 10 or 20 years.

[00:26:02] Eric Goranson: to stay away from this

[00:26:09] Craig Williams: Mm-hmm. , you know, because so much, so much of this stuff is like, Hey, we'll use this essential oil or use this. Like, here's, here's the issue is any oil will kill any bug every time. Yeah. And it's just, it's just because like, if you spray a bug with oil, like they, we breathe through our nose, they breathe through their whole body.

[00:26:44] Craig Williams: But like, if you just, you know, spritz it around your kitchen, it's not gonna do anything other than smell like lemongrass. Yeah.

[00:26:54] Craig Williams: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[00:27:00] Craig Williams: But yeah, so there, there are, and, and then even then, like we, we have a, I'll just, I'll give you a for instance.

[00:27:34] Craig Williams: Sure. So, and even then, once you dilute it, it it'll irritate you

[00:27:41] Craig Williams: sense. But it's a natural product. Right. And so like, there's, there's a big confusion when people start saying, well, what about more natural products? Well, like that can, that can mean just about anything.

[00:28:01] Eric Goranson: people to point that Sue, just natural doesn't mean need to use it. Right. , I mean, let's be

[00:28:21] Craig Williams: You know, say what it is cuz there's, you know, anyway. You can use that to flush carpenter ants out. It's, it's used as a flushing agent sometimes. Got it. So, but at the end of the day, environmental issues is what saves the day. Because if you can eliminate the source of what's causing them to be there, then all you have to do is follow them back to the nest.

[00:29:11] Craig Williams: I mean, I, I'd throw a fit. I absolutely would. Yeah. But I mean, like, they've, they've made it increasingly available to the public. Um, And it's, it's used irresponsibly. Uh, e eventually be because they've made it available to the public. Eventually we're gonna start seeing it in our waterways, and as soon as that happens, it'll go away.

[00:29:31] Eric Goranson: Yeah. I had a way there. I was fighting mosquitoes in my house. Um, not this one I'm currently at, this was a couple houses ago in it. Mm-hmm. It's a mile from here, so it wasn't that far, but I had this canal that was behind my house that fed the lake, but it was stagnant most of the time. Mm-hmm.

[00:30:09] Eric Goranson: Yeah. Those that are

[00:30:25] Craig Williams: I mean, you can drink it, it tastes weird. Yeah. Um, but yeah, it's that, I mean, that, that is , that is an all natural product. I mean, you're, you're ba there's a microorganism in the water just like there is in, you know, any standing bottle of water. Sure. You're just, you're just adding one that's beneficial.

[00:30:41] Eric Goranson: I would just get out there probably once a month cuz it'd kind of float up and down the thing. It moved a little bit mm-hmm. and I'd just haw 'em over the fence each month. I'd go to the home improvement store, grab 'em, huck 'em over the fence and yeah, it was still, you know, 30 feet down to it and, um, man, that, that cut my mosquitoes down by probably

[00:30:58] Craig Williams: I don't doubt it. I mean Cause you're [00:31:00] getting 'em at the source. Yeah. They, they don't like to travel very far. So that's where they're breeding, that's where they're laying their eggs. It just makes sense and it's. Yeah,

[00:31:17] Eric Goranson: Mm-hmm. . Do those

[00:31:36] Craig Williams: No. Um, I mean, so there's, there's basically two forms of treatment. You can, you can fog the yard mm-hmm. with like a hand fogger, you know, we have like, you know, big backpack units that we use. Sure. Um, and that can be really effective, um, because you, you combine a pesticide with an, what they call an ig. Um, and the IGR affects the reproductive cycle, um mm-hmm.

[00:32:20] Craig Williams: So it's, it's gonna be designed to how your property works and where you want to be. And most of the time they're on remote control. Um, yep. And they're, they're super reliable and, and what's great about 'em is like, they can be there when my guys can't Yeah, that makes

[00:32:40] Craig Williams: automated.

[00:32:55] Eric Goranson: result. So I'm gonna share my screen here. Okay.

[00:33:19] Craig Williams: Oh yeah. So we had a fleet of those. Oh, really? Cool. Yeah. We, we sold it about 12 or 15 years ago now. Um, and we had four, four trucks and we were, we would do anywhere from two to six neighborhoods per truck every night. Mm-hmm. , uh, through the season here in here in Houston. Um, here, here's, here's the deal with that stuff, man.

[00:33:59] Eric Goranson: I love the [00:34:00] byline on this. Kids today just don't know the joy of running behind the one of these in the fog .

[00:34:09] Craig Williams: Right. You know, and when we, when we were doing it, you know, I, and this is, this is actually how I started in our company. I, I started working for my dad when I was 15. Mm-hmm. , um, you know, working on little engines to, to operate those things and Wow. Like we would only do it at night. Like, and you Well, yeah.

[00:34:29] Eric Goranson: there one, they're out and two less people

[00:34:46] Eric Goranson: Okay. So that, that's what it looks like. It looks like a diesel fog now that think about

[00:34:50] Craig Williams: It, that's exactly what it is. It's not heated. It's pressurized. Yeah. And then, and then put through a, a fogger essentially. Yeah. And like, man, it's, it's, it's [00:35:00] a cool, I mean, like, you're using like medical grade pumps. It's, it's a mm-hmm. , it's a intricate system. Um, and it takes a lot of maintenance to maintain those things.

[00:35:32] Craig Williams: Yep. You know, and we had to put on like a respirator and full rubber gloves mm-hmm. with the thing in order to even get it out of the, the barrel. Um, so I mean, like, it, it's, it's stout stuff. And, and then to like, combine that with diesel and then just like, you know, we're just gonna pump it out willy-nilly into the neighborhood.

[00:35:57] Eric Goranson: Well, and here's the thing. Let's, let's do some [00:36:00] simple math here, right? Mm-hmm. , you're driving down the road and doing this, think of the cubic volume of air in the neighborhood, right? And you're driving down these little streets that are 24 feet wide mm-hmm.

[00:36:26] Craig Williams: you think about it. No, no. And here's this'll, this'll blow your mind, man. And this is a conversation I had several years ago, but it was a, uh, a professor down at, uh, Mississippi.

[00:36:56] Eric Goranson: Because one, it pushes everything up, you [00:37:00] know, the other way. Right. And then two, it dumps water and fills up everything that can take water. So now you've got this feeding ground. I can only imagine what

[00:37:16] Craig Williams: Mm-hmm. . Um, but anyway, what he was telling me, because he was, he was showing me pictures, he was flying around in a helicopter because there was parts of Mississippi and Alabama, Louisiana, all that area without power. And so people were living without air conditioning. Their windows were open and they were just getting decimated by mosquitoes.

[00:37:53] Craig Williams: Eliminate them permanently. Yeah. They're just un like, we ha it's . It's like the billion dollar, the million dollar [00:38:00] man. Right. We have the technology. Yep. Like we can do it, but they don't know the consequences and so they're unwilling to pull the trigger. And I say kuda good for them. I mean, like, but like, let's never let anybody else know what that is.

[00:38:21] Eric Goranson: you know, when you, when you're getting into that kind of, Bioscience of engineering, and I'm not this guy, so I'm by no means an expert

[00:38:51] Eric Goranson: Yeah. Before that we didn't have honeybees here.

[00:38:59] Eric Goranson: well, honeybees by the [00:39:00] way, I'm just saying that, that's, they're not, some been here for a thousand gunny years

[00:39:10] Craig Williams: I, I keep bees. I, and yeah, I love bees. I, I love 'em too. But like, when people start telling me like, oh, they're in danger and they're in decline, and I'm like, no. Have you actually like, looked at the numbers? Like they're doing great? Yeah. Like they've, they've adapted. . Um, and, and I can That's how they got it.

[00:39:48] Eric Goranson: movie, the Bee movie too, but yeah.

[00:39:59] Eric Goranson: But yeah, [00:40:00] that, that, that is what, what you would think would be the most inhabitable place for a be to live. And they do

[00:40:16] Craig Williams: Yeah. Um, you know, and it's, it's not to say that we shouldn't be responsible with pesticides. And there's, there's like, here, here's the other thing that really bugs me about this, this honeybee stuff, man is bugs you. They, what? They, they call it colony collapse disorder. Do you know why they call it that?

[00:40:57] Craig Williams: And, and, and so like there's, it's just pure [00:41:00] speculation. It like, look, you could, you could claim that a colony collapse and all it did was swarm and you didn't notice.

[00:41:09] Craig Williams: the street. Yeah. Yeah. And like, and you'll, you'll hear stories all the time of vandals that just go through and knock over people's beehives just cuz they think it's fun jerks.

[00:41:25] Eric Goranson: murder hornets up here, man. I'm, I'm murder Hornet territory.

[00:41:36] Eric Goranson: Yeah. It was just north of me here by eh, five or six hours, but yeah.

[00:41:42] Eric Goranson: cool thing is, is I think they've got it watching them go in and, and we'll keep this on subject here, but watching them go in and try to capture that hive mm-hmm. and keep 'em in there was interesting. Oh yeah. They came in like was their video two and there's some video on it [00:42:00] co I'll find it and sent it over to you.

[00:42:15] Craig Williams: there. They, I guess they did it at night, I'm guessing. Yeah, I think they did.

[00:42:34] Craig Williams: have you, have you ever seen a picture of a cicada killer?

[00:42:46] Eric Goranson: Cicada killer. Okay. I gotta pull this up now

[00:42:53] Craig Williams: it up here. So, after that story ran about murder, dude. Yeah. At least twice a [00:43:00] week. I think I've got, I think I've got the murder. Hornet. . Wow. .

[00:43:10] Craig Williams: they are, they're completely benign. Really? Yeah. Like there's. They, they don't, I mean like, like, like any wasp man, like, it's just like, yeah.

[00:43:21] Eric Goranson: not a fan of WASP by the way. I, I, I, I, we can eradicate those personally and I'd be totally cool with that. .

[00:43:41] Craig Williams: It's, it's massive. I got a baby murder Hornet. Yeah. Yeah. And so people are like, I think I got 'em. So, but like, they, they dig holes in the ground and they, they don't, they're not aggressive at all. I mean, like, you could squat. Okay, cool. They could, they would care less. Um, but they're just big and scary looking and Yeah.

[00:44:05] Eric Goranson: but, but the news grabbed it. Oh,

[00:44:17] Craig Williams: um, you know, like, like a dirt dobber. Yeah. Um, they're unsightly, they, you know, make a, I don't know if you guys have 'em, but like, they make, you know, eastern eastern side of our

[00:44:29] Craig Williams: Yeah. That, well, that makes sense. But like, they make u ugly mud balls on the side of your house.

[00:44:48] Eric Goranson: take the, I'll take the mud Dobber.

[00:45:09] Eric Goranson: Oh. And we'd be walking around these, the right down these things, these roads kind of mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. and all of a sudden, holy smokes, this red tarantula would pop up out of the ground and these guys would go over and kill it. And I'd go, what's that? And they'd go, those are gonna kill you, so be careful.

[00:45:33] Craig Williams: they're like the trap door spiders. Yeah.

[00:45:39] Craig Williams: Oh. So they're not very, they just pop out. Were they not very big, uh, the size of my hand. Okay. Yeah. That's, that's big enough. Big enough. ,

[00:45:58] Eric Goranson: Wow. Okay. Yeah. [00:46:00] This is not

[00:46:16] Eric Goranson: story was with my wife and she's gonna kill me for telling this story.

[00:46:37] Eric Goranson: Just . I'm out.

[00:46:44] Eric Goranson: We'll drive by a house that burned to the ground. She goes, see, they had a spider. That's right.

[00:46:52] Eric Goranson: I'm like, well, so anyway, I'm, I'm the spider killer in my house. That's how it goes. It's good to know your role. Yeah, absolutely.

[00:47:02] Eric Goranson: There we go. There we go. I know, but like three o'clock in the morning, it's not my favorite roll . Oh, okay. Hold on. You know,

[00:47:15] Eric Goranson: So what are your solutions? I mean, like, for instance here and, and pest control gets beyond just bugs, but mm-hmm. , you know, we, we. That neighbor. Sometimes with birds, you've got a lot of birds, like a lot of people do in the neighborhoods. But yeah, you get that neighbor that goes out there and decides they're gonna feed all the birds and they're, they're taking the 50 pound bag of bird feeding, pouring across their concrete patio and just leaving it out there.

[00:47:53] Craig Williams: Well with, with squirrels, they're a little bit different.

[00:48:19] Craig Williams: And usually if you, if you have access to a state or national forest, it's, it's perfectly fine to re to release 'em in there. Um, got it. So you can do that. Rats and mice is a different story. Um, you know, there are, there are a lot of cool innovations when it comes to, uh, kil traps for, for rats in particular.

[00:49:00] Craig Williams: Okay. And there's a trigger that they hit with their nose and when they hit that trigger, it breaks their neck. Wow. And, and so, and it's a multi kill. And so you, you mount it to like the side of, you know, inside a warehouse or outside your house mm-hmm. or something like that. And you know, like only, only a rat or a mouse could stick its head up in there that you, like your cat couldn't stick its head up in there.

[00:49:36] Craig Williams: You stick that mm-hmm. and then it'll, I mean, you'll see how it breaks the number two pencil and Okay. And it actually has , it has a scorekeeper on the outside. That's amazing. You'll amazing. You'll know how many times it goes off because you know, like you gotta clean it out at some point. Well, no, it just, it just drops the body underneath and so Oh,

[00:49:53] Eric Goranson: So it just, it shows up. It's like, ah.

[00:50:08] Craig Williams: But what can happen is like a raccoon will come along and carry 'em off, or like a Sure. A bird of prey or something like that. Yep. Um, and for people that are concerned about transference of poisons from it's good solution, you know, from, from like when like you kill a rat and like another animal eats it.

[00:50:41] Craig Williams: Mo most of those poisons are blood thinners. Yeah. And what an anticoagulant is what they call it. Exactly. Yeah. Um, and, and so, but this is a, is an effective way that you can do that. Without poisons.

[00:51:01] Craig Williams: that you see out there. I hate glue traps, man.

[00:51:21] Eric Goranson: those? We have squirrels. We got squirrels everywhere.

[00:51:42] Craig Williams: but they don't, I mean, do you guys, do you guys have a lot of pe Where are they get in people's houses like they do down here?

[00:51:48] Eric Goranson: ha not as bad, just cuz there's so many places for them to be, all the trees and all this stuff, they pretty much would rather hang out there than in somebody's house just because, you know, they, they kind of want their own space. So it [00:52:00] happens, but it's pretty rare.

[00:52:05] Craig Williams: No. This is all

[00:52:11] Craig Williams: pretty tall and straight, right? Tall straight. Yep. Yeah. See that's, that's the, that's the issue here. It's like we have pine trees, but then we also have like those, those low live oaks. Yep. And what happens is, is people like, you know, again, this is, this is property maintenance, but like you want to keep the branches trim back from the roof.

[00:52:50] Craig Williams: Yeah. Um, because they'll go, you know, if you let 'em grow, they'll eventually get up tall enough where you know they're gonna provide the shade that you want. Yeah. It's just not gonna be immediate. So you just gotta keep those [00:53:00] branches trim back. It's smart. And

[00:53:12] Eric Goranson: But, uh, yeah. Anything up against the house, bushes, trees, any of that stuff, you're just, you know, you've got the freeway exit right into your house for all those pests.

[00:53:31] Craig Williams: Yeah. Like, if you're talking termites, like a good rule of thumb is six inches of exposure on your slab, right? Yeah. I mean, because what they're gonna do is they're gonna tube mm-hmm. . And so as long as you can see the foundation, you're gonna be able to, you know, you know, once a month do a visual inspection on the foundation.

[00:54:11] Craig Williams: Put in, you know, uh, a weed guard, and then come back through with rock and give yourself about a foot edge. Because what happens is that so many people, you know, they don't, when they go through and mulch. Like, yeah, they're flower beds. They don't pull out the old mulch, and so it just gets higher and higher.

[00:54:47] Craig Williams: Yeah. They're, they all have access. If you have a brick home, really good access, cuz you have weep poles and you're

[00:54:55] Craig Williams: Yeah. And you're, you're probably covering up the weep pole, which means you're probably creating a, a [00:55:00] moisture issue inside the house.

[00:55:11] Eric Goranson: Man. Craig, before we go, what else did we not talk about with pest control? I mean, we could do hours of this and we probably will, but,

[00:55:25] Craig Williams: Okay. Uh, it's, it's the product I use 95% of the time when it's, when it's dealing with this kind of stuff. Um, you know, and don't, don't listen to me go do your own research on it. But there are incredible studies coming outta University of Florida right now. Okay. Talking about how, what's great about it is it's, there's no pesticide in the soil.

[00:56:10] Craig Williams: Um, and so like when, earlier when I was talking about, you know, on average you've got about 20 colonies in your yard, . I mean, like that's a barrier around your home that all those colonies are now feeding on Nice. That you can potentially eliminate. Um, and again, like so that's why

[00:56:28] Eric Goranson: Exactly. And that way you've just got a, you've got an island there of, of protection.

[00:56:42] Craig Williams: Yeah. Um, so yeah.

[00:56:55] Craig Williams: Yeah, I mean, you can reach me on Facebook, uh, pretty much on any of my pages.

[00:57:21] Craig Williams: You got it.

[00:57:34] Craig Williams: and my it is, it is a labor of love. That is for sure. So it is, no, it's, it's, uh, we've been, we've been at it for four years now.

[00:57:42] Eric Goranson: how's it been? Four years. Oh, wow.

[00:58:02] Craig Williams: We love doing interviews, but we, we do product reviews from time to time. Um, and we also just talk about life in general. So, we'll, I mean, we'll just go about an hour and a half. Um, yep. But we started doing a lot of live events. Uh, we've got another live event coming up on the 19th. We're gonna go talk to Nice, a bunch of contractors and HVAC and flooring guys, um, and interview a bunch of them.

[00:58:46] Craig Williams: You know, whether that be like HVAC flooring, uh, plumbing, electrical, what, whatever it is. Like there were so many talented guys. Yeah. And their marketing sucked. Um, and it was like, if people just knew who you were, [00:59:00] they would use more, people would use you, but you, you don't, you don't have the tools in order to get your name out there.

[00:59:24] Craig Williams: We're in 12 different countries. Um, you know, it's, it's been fun. Um, and my, my, my wife lovingly refers to it as my hobby. Um, which it is. Cool. Hey, ,

[00:59:43] Craig Williams: It, it bothered me at first, but then she was like, look, there are a lot worse things you could be doing.

[00:59:55] Eric Goranson: Yeah. I mean, and here's the thing, and as people know out there that Haveve ever done podcasts, it's a labor of [01:00:00] love. You have to put years into it for it to become, you know, anything zero as far as financially for you.

[01:00:13] Craig Williams: Yeah. And, and we've, we've always appreciated your support, man. You've been a huge encouragement to us. Cuz I mean, you know, you're the, the, the godfather of this, of this space. . I dunno about that, but thanks . Uh, but yeah, man, it's, it's, it's, it's cool to get to be friends with people who are, uh, you, that that's the, that I think that's one of the coolest things about podcasting, man, is like, there's, I've rarely met a competitor.

[01:00:53] Craig Williams: Like that is like, well, you can do this, you could do that. You could totally have a show. I'm like, what would I talk about? I was like, what are we talking about right now? [01:01:00] Yeah.

[01:01:17] Eric Goranson: You know, I do this for a living. Yeah. But it's very lonely as well, because you don't see the people you're talking to unless you're doing live mm-hmm. . Yeah. You record it, you send it off into the ether and you see numbers. Yeah. Then you get social media feedback, but that's really all

[01:01:36] Craig Williams: Yeah. And that, that it, it is, it's like, What, what, what does that mean? I mean, yeah, it could be like, it was a complete train wreck and so everybody's, everybody's slowing down to watch the , the aftermath. Yeah. You know, it could be or it could be like, Hey, that was really good. I had, I had something going there.

[01:02:17] Eric Goranson: people and you gotta get stuff thrown at you first.

[01:02:31] Eric Goranson: yeah, potentially, usually those, what happens is those people get burned out cuz they start watching the numbers, they watch the numbers and they're like, okay, we're, we're, we're losing people instead of gaining And then about show eight, they're gone.

[01:03:00] Eric Goranson: Yeah. It's crazy. I mean we're, you know, around the house here, and I know you guys out there listening to this too, around the house. We're at 1464 as far as 1,464

[01:03:19] Eric Goranson: But you know what I mean with this has been, this is a radio show that's been going on for 34, coming on 35 years this year.

[01:03:30] Craig Williams: Well, yeah, you, I mean you're the the, the pump was primed. Yeah, it was ready go. It's like, what, what's, what's one more place to send our content? We're already recording

[01:03:45] Eric Goranson: That's

[01:03:45] Craig Williams: you . That's right.

[01:03:53] Craig Williams: Uh, homeowner show.com. But you can find it on any podcast platform. Uh, we actually just, uh, uh, hit our, we just [01:04:00] started using YouTube the other day. Uh, nice. And so we, we've got our first thousand subscribers on there.

[01:04:14] Eric Goranson: question. So we're doing it. Awesome man. Congrats and best of luck with that. We'll have you back on again next time. Appreciate it, bud. Alright, he's all right. I'm Eric G and you've been listening to Around The House