Using Houseplants to Clean Your Home’s Air

There is a heightened interest for many people to include house plants that effectively clean the air in their living environments.

Many building products commonly found today in homes contain harmful chemicals – formaldehyde, benzene and carbon monoxide are just a few of the airborne pollutants that can cause health problems down the road.

Listed below are houseplants that not only will absorb noxious pollutants in the air, but will also release fresh oxygen into your home’s environment. An additional benefit is that the care of these plants is very minimal, yet their benefits are incalculable.

Peace Lilly – this plant is identified as having long, dark green leaves and has a lily that produces a bloom that had a white hood. It can be grown in minimal light, but the ideal is a situation that provides full sunlight for the majority of the day. Peace Lilly’s are effective filters of formaldehyde, a chemical commonly emitted by particle or pressed wood found in floor coverings and furniture, fire retardants, household chemicals and clothing that’s permanent – pressed. Kerosene and natural gas are additional sources of much of the formaldehyde found in homes today.     

English Ivy – this plant effectively removes formaldehyde, and it’s usually available in over dozens of varieties. English Ivy is best grown in a hanging basket, since it climbs quite rapidly, and should be located in a place that receives indirect sunlight only. Also note – English Ivy should not be situated in an area directly in front of or below any heat registers in your home.

Rubber Plants – easy to recognize by their thick, green and dark shiny leaves, this plant is best located in an area that receives minimal sunlight. Rubber plants are good at removing formaldehyde from the air.

Palms – these are found in many varieties; areca, lady and bamboo are the most common. Not only are palms effective are removing toxins from the air, but they also have the added benefit of adding up to a gallon of moisture into the air every day. Palms are ideal for those homes that need a lot of heat during the winter, since their humidifying properties are well – known. Palms tend to do best when they’re grown in indirect light, and they should be watered to the point where their soil is faintly moist, but never obviously wet.

Florist Mum – also known as the Chrysanthemum, Florist Mums come in a variety of colors; yellows, pinks and reds are the most commonly found. Florist Mums are effective plants at ridding your home’s air of chemicals like ammonia (cleaning supplies) and benzene (often found being emitted via pesticides, gasoline, ink and paint).  

Along with the use of a Hepa purifier, houseplants can greatly add to an efficent and productive air purification system for your home. Their air filtration qualities have been well – documented over the years, and they definitely deserve a place in any home environment.

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Bed Bug Control

Once thought of something that you usually only encountered in less – developed countries, bedbugs have fast become one of the more prominent and frequent pests that have infected homes across the country.

The increasing globalization of our world and the travelers that crisscross our planet are suspected as being among the prime movers behind this new infestation. When these travelers stay in hotels the bedbugs often migrate from their clothing or luggage onto other visitors, who then carry them across the nation. It’s also believed that some types of bedbugs may begin feeding on their human hosts if their main food supply (like bats or mice) are eliminated. Regardless of the reasons behind this pernicious insect’s colonization, the reality is that once you discover bedbugs habituating in your home the faster you need to act upon their eradication.

Telltale Signs of Infestation

Fortunately, it’s fairly easy to discover bedbugs in your home – you may find welts or bug bites around your midsection, or even red spots from your blood on your bed linens or clothing. Bedbugs like to feed on human beings, and their feeding habits are quite similar to mosquitoes. Also similar to mosquitoes, you won’t feel their bites while they’re feeding, and you may discover their shedding skins on your bed – they also tend to remain dormant for up to a year, so getting rid of them quickly can be a problematic exercise at times. Bedbugs are brownish and usually are flat and less than 4mm in length, which makes them hard to see before they run off and hide in the cracks in fabric or wood, which often can be found in our bedding and furniture. Simply put, ick. 

Eradication Steps

To begin with, you have to completely inspect the furniture where you’ve found the bedbugs – and since this usually means your bedroom, you must dismantle your bed frame and look into the crevices and cracks in order to find out where they’re hiding. Also inspect the desk and dresser, as well as your box spring and mattress. Next, use your vacuum and crevice tool to suck out the bugs in the furniture, paying particular attention to the baseboards and any other cracks that you can find – do this in every other room in your house, then seal the bag when you’re done and dispose of it outside in your trash immediately.

You then have to thoroughly wash all of your cloths and bed sheets/linens in hot water, and dry them in the “hot” setting in your clothes dryer – this drying needs to last at least one hour, lest the bugs survive with their eggs intact.

Eradication without Pesticides

If you’re willing to buy a steamer, you can use this regularly to clean your mattress, taking care not to miss any crevices or cracks each time you use it – you must steam clean your mattress for at least once a week for nine weeks in order to be sure you’re completely free of the bedbugs.    

   
Wash everything, even your carpets. Items and clothing that cannot be washed have to be sealed tightly in plastic for at least two weeks, and if you have a freezer available, use it to store items as well for the two – week period. Carpets must be vacuumed thoroughly and also steam – cleaned to ensure that the eggs that are hibernating in the fibers are eliminated.

What if I Still Have an Infestation?

If you find that the problem still exists, then you’ll have to get rid of your mattress, and also probably use a professional pest control company. However, if the above steps are followed faithfully, these cases are rare – all it usually takes are the cleaning procedures being enacted over the course of a number of weeks.

Along with the need for air purification in our homes, the goal for a completely clean home environment necessitates the immediate removal and extermination of bedbugs, as soon as their presence is detected.   

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