What home improvement work did you do today?

My special needs brother-in-law would to!

 

The stuff was delivered today for my new roof. They start on Thursday and think they'll be done on Sunday. I gave the delivery guy an energy drink and, because of that, I think he tried extra hard to make sure we'll still be able to use our driveway.

 

If you have a pool and hate to vacuum it as much as I do then you need 1 of these in your life. Left for a few days and came home to the only clean pool in town after all the wind.

 

We've got a dolphin cleaner and it's great! Clean out the filters every couple weeks and good to go. Scrubs the walls too

 

Last year, I rebuilt our polaris unit that is about 30 years old.......still works great. Looks like this one - parts are readily available and no electronics to deal with!!!

 

This one climbs the walls also, sometimes too much and it draws air. Before this we had 1 with a "tail" that would whip around, sometimes it would pop out of the water and hose down people on the patio

 

I like the stand alone bag, seems like a better idea then filling up the skimmer with pine needles. Does that tail ever squirt at ya? LOL
It was always hilarious to see the look of shock on the sun bathers.

 

My father in law has one like that. Took me a so second to realize it wasn't someone with a water gun. Ha

 

Yes! It climbs walls and the tail whips up and squirts (The hose attaches to the jet and that's what propels it). My daughters are always bringing their friends to sunbathe and it inevitably causes a lot of screams when the water jets out and pelts them!!!!

 

Took the excess metal from the barn and started covering my well equipment.



Cleaned the roof to trace a water leak:





and got my ass kicked dumping rock to stop erosion from the roof runoff.

 

anyone have a trick to keep roaches from coming up through the drains? lately ive been dealing with german cockroaches in my dishwasher and they are pissing me off!
so far I have tried the bleach trick where you run it with a bowl of bleach in it to clean the drain and i have treated the whole place with an over the counter roach spray and they are just getting worse.

 

I wonder if something like this would help; we use it for fruit flies. Also have you tried boiling water? We do once a month boiling water with a product called thrift….

$60 Fruit Fly & Drain Fly Killer - Simple Commercial Drain Gel Treatment - Eliminates Gross Fruit Flies, Drain Flies, Sewer Flies & Gnat Infestations from Any Drain Fast & Easy - 2.5 Gallon (320 Ounces)

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B07WSFJTNL?ref=ppx_pop_mob_b_asin_title

 

If you need to treat the whole house, Boric acid has worked for us for all insects, including roaches. Just keep it away from pets.

 

its worth a shot, also going to bait the hell out of the place with the combat gel. I dont think they are nesting (yet) but just coming up from the drain overnight because i only see them in the dishwasher and kitchen sink

 

We have those around here but I've never seen them come up through the drain. We have a bug company that sprays the outside perimeter of our house and that has helped a lot. The cat pretty much takes care of the rest of them.

 

Roofer came out to start the install. Had a crew of about 20 with him. I knew we were in trouble when they were walking around the house staring up the roof and talking to each other. Instead of a 2 day project, it's now a 4 day. They ordered extra equipment to do it safely at no cost to us and are pushing it back a week. All of which I'm cool with.

 

Start baiting them, it may take several weeks to kill the colony, but that is generally the only way to kill them successfully, during this time (and after if you don't want them back) your kitchen needs to be kept pristine so that they are forced to eat the bait. Try not to kill any while you are baiting as that will defeat the purpose. You want to also use spray to target younger roaches who are not yet foraging. Here is a kit from DIY pest control. I have thankfully, never ever had this issue, but if you want additional info just watch any roach control video from pest companies to get the idea of how to use the kit and where to put the bait and chemicals. Best of luck... The roaches aren't living in your drains, at least not all of them, so just treating those will not eradicate them. https://diypestcontrol.com/ultimate-roach-bait-kit

Also stop using the dishwasher so they will stop going in there for food source, instead put bait in the dishwasher (read chemical labels first to make sure it's ok to do that).

-T

 

Hopefully you know how these are, because they are the worst of the roach families to combat. When I lived in the condo, my neighbors lived with them peacefully, making my unit an all out war against them. When I finally won, it was with these products. That said, what i did for the drains was run hot water for 30 minutes or so and then poured burst shots of Simple Green down the drains and then flushed again with hot water. On the last flush of the week, I would fill the sink to capacity and then pull the drain plug, making a solid rushing of pipe filling water.

Under the sink and dishwasher i placed these:



Full disclosure, I dont know if these did a damn thing but they would dry out and i would use them because they slowed down.

Then, along the baseboards I put this stuff:



and then i took off my outlet covers and "poofed" this gunk in the walls:



Eventually they were all gone and when I sold the place there was no evidence of the roaches.

 

PS, they are not typically a drain pest. I did the drain clean because I wanted to be sure aaaaannnd.... the previous tenant poured enough shit down the drain that I found maggots in my line when I was swapping setups.

 

Good to know it will be done safer!

 

Thanks y'all. Going full warfare. Barrier spray, gel bait and stations, daily drain sanitizing, and I'll move the dog food to the living room. I'll stop using the dishwasher and leave it open a bit to completely dry out, probably wouldn't hurt to check the dishwasher drain and clean it out.
What am I missing?

 

Remove all counter foods and low level foods. Mop and then hit edges with poison. Keep dog out of kitchen until dry or wiped up. The kitchen area as a whole needs to be spotless so they have no food or water. Water is often missed in the clean up.

The dish washer is a sealed unit draining to your sink drain. wouldnt hurt for peace of mind, but also should not be a factor.

 

My grandma is a firm believer that rinsing dishes is a waste of time and water, there is probably some nastiness in the bottom of that bad boy. I'm working on it with her, but she probably won't get it until I show her what I pull out of there

No matter what I know or how many times I go around the block I'll always just be a dumbass kid to them. It's frustrating
Damn Boomers.

 

yup... I am thankful that is not the case for me. however, I have seen it first hand with others.

 

Do you have a garbage disposal in your sink? If so, you can crush some ice cubes with some dish soap to help clean the insides and lines

 

Spring break visit to Dad's place down near the coast. He's been letting the place get back to some sort of wildlife preserve. After the divorce, and near death experience from having a lifetime of Hep C, he's pretty much over keeping the place up.

Now he's 78 and just wants to sit in the La-Z-Boy so I brought my trusty DeWalt chainsaw down to clear some brush in what used to be the main entrance to our pasture.

The fun part of it all: most of this stuff is Mesquite which, y'all may know, has all sorts of fun 1-2" long thorns that have the propensity to easily bypass cowhide leather gloves.

Pic dump:


Main goal was to clear a path for a mower to get in there. Think mission was accomplished.

 

Nice job! Mesquite is some mean shit!

 

Yeah, I gotta few battle scars

 

Funny how it comes full circle Texasrho83 your a good man!

 

getting reading to dive in to some shit...