Pest Control in Palmdale, FL

A rural community on the edge of cypress country

Palmdale is small, and it sits where US 27 crosses the north end of Glades County. The community was settled in 1901 by the Florida Fruit Farm, and a railroad with a bridge over Fisheating Creek reached the area in 1917. Cattle country and cypress swamp surround it, and Fisheating Creek is one of the last free flowing creeks in the state.

Homes here are spread out on larger parcels, often with barns, equipment sheds and pasture. There is no storm drain system to speak of, so low ground holds water after the wet season. That combination of open land, standing water and old outbuildings is what defines pest pressure in Palmdale.

Palmdale is a crossroads community, not a town in the usual sense. US 27 runs through it at the north end of Glades County, and the settlement around the intersection of the old Florida Fruit Farm land still amounts to a handful of streets, a store and a lot of open country. The railroad and a bridge over Fisheating Creek arrived here in 1917, and the creek is still the most important feature on the map.

Fisheating Creek itself is unusual: it is one of the last free flowing creeks left in Florida, running through cypress swamp and wet prairie without a dam on it. That means seasonal flooding all along its course and a band of permanently damp ground around it. Ranches, cattle pasture and citrus parcels fill the rest of the landscape, along with sand pine and palmetto scrub on the higher ground.

Yard and pasture edge care in Palmdale

Most Palmdale properties keep a small block of turf around the house and leave the rest in pasture. We keep that yard turf thick on a schedule for sandy ground, treat chinch bugs and mole crickets in the soil and thatch, and handle weeds in the ornamental beds. Open pasture is a different job. Also, we will say so rather than sell a lawn program for land it does not fit.

Palmdale, holding by holding

The US 27 crossing itself

A handful of commercial buildings, a store and a fuel stop, with houses set back off the highway. Roaches and rodents in the older structures, and fire ants in the disturbed ground along the road shoulder.

Fisheating Creek and the campground road

Cypress swamp, wet prairie and seasonal flooding. Mosquitoes from the creek bottom, snakes along the banks, and termites in any structure with timber near the damp ground.

The cattle parcels north and east of the crossing

Pasture, fence lines and working pens. Fire ant mounds along fence lines and under gates, and rodents in feed storage, which draws snakes in behind them.

The citrus and row crop blocks to the south

Groves and cultivated ground with equipment yards at the edges. When the rows are worked, rodents move out toward the nearest shed, barn or house.

Manufactured home properties on acreage

Homes on piers with skirting, plus a barn or shipping container for storage. Termites in the pier blocking and rim joists, rodents in the skirting void, and wasps under the eaves by late summer.

State Road 29 toward the south end

A scattering of houses, small farms and open scrub. Ticks in the brush, snakes along the fences, and the kind of fire ant pressure that only whole property baiting holds down.

Creek bottom, pine flatwoods and the highway

Palmdale sits on Fisheating Creek, and that creek is unusual for South Florida because it still runs its own course. It is the only free flowing tributary into Lake Okeechobee. It drains a broad cypress swamp. Also, it floods its bottom land most years. This leaves wide strips of standing water, drowned vegetation and mud on either side of the channel. Mosquitoes produced in that flood plain do not respect property lines. A house near the creek will see them from spring into autumn regardless of what is happening on the lot itself. Away from the creek the ground is sand and flatwoods that drain almost instantly. So lawns here dry out between rains, and the pest pressure shifts to whatever lives in the palmetto and pine around the house.

Also, the land use around Palmdale is ranch, grove and timber. In addition, cattle pasture, citrus and the caladium fields that the Lake Placid area is known for sit alongside pine flatwoods managed with periodic controlled burning. Burning and mowing both push rodents, snakes and insects out of the brush and toward the nearest roof. Abandoned hunting camps and seasonal homes give them an empty structure to move into. On a working property the pest list starts outdoors: flies and roaches around any feed or livestock building, rodents in equipment sheds and grain storage, fire ants along the fence lines and in the pastures, and termites in any outbuilding where wood meets the soil. Rural mailboxes, pump houses and well sheds are all part of the inspection on a property like this.

The highway, the landmarks and the routes

Also, the highway and the landmarks say where you are. In addition, US 27 runs straight through Palmdale. Meanwhile, the highway makes the community a stop on the route between Lake Placid and Moore Haven. Fuel, food and equipment traffic moves through it every day. The Fisheating Creek Outpost and campground sit on the north side of the highway. They concentrate campers, canoes, dumpsters and standing water at the creek crossing. Lake Placid and the caladium farms sit a few minutes north. Venus and the Highlands County line are east, Glades County’s seat at Moore Haven is west, and the Brighton Reservation is on the same side of the county. Around all of it, palmettos, cabbage palms, oak hammocks and cypress keep the cover that pests use to move from conservation land to living room.

Palmdale properties we work

Palmdale work runs along US 27 and the county roads around it, plus the properties near Fisheating Creek, the crossroads at State Road 29, and the ranches and parcels between Palmdale and Moore Haven to the south.

Work covers the US 27 corridor through Palmdale, the properties along Fisheating Creek and the Fish Eating Creek campground road, the crossroads at State Road 29, and the cattle and citrus parcels between Palmdale and Moore Haven to the south. LaBelle and Clewiston are on the same run.

Every Palmdale property gets a free inspection first, then one of six services takes on the work:

• residential pest control for rural homes→
• termite control for houses and outbuildings→
• rodent removal and exclusion on acreage→
• bed bug treatment for Palmdale homes→
• lawn and ornamental care around the house→
• commercial pest control for rural businesses→

The crossroads at the creek

Palmdale is Glades County’s crossroads on US 27, where the highway meets the old ranch country between the Caloosahatchee’s headwaters and the Fisheating Creek swamp to the west. Fisheating Creek’s wildlife management area runs for miles through cypress sloughs and longleaf flatwoods that drain slowly after summer rain. Their wildlife does not read fence lines: raccoons, opossums, armadillos and the occasional displaced black bear use the creek corridor straight through the ranchettes’ back acres. The town’s few streets sit among cattle ranches and orange groves, and the housing is ranchettes and mobile homes on fenced acreage. So treatments here work around horses, goats, poultry and the free range dogs that patrol most yards. The scrub sand drains so fast that wells run deep here. The dry natural lots push fire ants toward the irrigated dooryards and the shade of the live oaks.

Palmdale property owners on our service