Summer is right around the corner! It’s a blissful time of year, and one that most of us spend the other three seasons eagerly anticipating. However, there’s no denying that summer does have its downsides. These aren’t substantial enough to ruin the season, but they can make summer a little less enjoyable, especially when it comes to our homes and gardens. Here are five annoying summer problems and how to solve them. *This post contains affiliate links.
1. Pests
Summer is the season where pests are in abundance. Flies, mosquitoes, wasps, ants and aphids are everywhere, and it can feel like you’re fighting a losing battle when it comes to keeping your home and garden clear of them.
While honey bees are welcome guests in our gardens, it is hard to enjoy the great outdoors with all the other unwanted pests. Here are a few ways to deter them.
- If you are dealing with a fly problem, consider getting a venus fly trap rather than using chemical solutions.
- If you are dealing with a mosquito problem, at-home remedies are limited in their scope, so you’re usually best calling in professionals such as Mosquito Squad to remedy the issue once and for all.
- Aphids can be a nightmare in the garden, but thankfully, you can mix a great deterrent spray that keeps your plants in the best possible condition. Luckily there is one pretty little bug that will help us with this problem, so if you see ladybugs around, that is a good thing!
- You can attempt to deter wasps with all-natural wasp repellent.
Five Spot Green Living
- It is also important to be able to identify wasp’s nests. Here is a helpful video:
Provided you are proactive with any pest problems you have, you should be able to keep the issue at bay throughout the summer months.
2. Lawn and Grass Problems
All that summer sunshine and vitamin D is a wonderful thing, and it’s guaranteed to put most of us in a great mood! However, if there is long period of dry and hot weather, then grass browning or bare patches can develop rather quickly. This kind of look is far from the verdant, beautiful landscape that most of us aim for, and can really ruin the overall appearance of outdoor spaces.
There are a few ways to prevent grass browning, but by far the most important is water. Use a sprinkler — you can even make one yourself — to distribute a decent amount of water onto your lawn at night, when the air is cooler and thus the water is less likely to just evaporate. If adequate water doesn’t resolve the problem, then you can also try an eco-friendly, organic fertilizer.
If using lots of water to water the lawn seems wasteful from an environmental stand point, you can always use the water from your own rain water barrel. If you are looking for beautiful rain water harvesting ideas, check out my recent post.
Rainwater Harvesting: 10 Beautiful Rain Barrel Ideas
3. High Humidity
Everyone loves the warm summer sunshine, but high humidity is a different matter! Humidty is one of those summer problems that can really be a nuisance. You’ll usually find that humidity is at its highest on days with heavy cloud cover, and the humidity level is also higher in the evening than it is during the day. It is even more annoying when the inside of your house becomes humid too. Dehumidifiers can be a big help but they have the downside of heating up the room they are in just a bit, so they are better suitable for basements in the summer. There are a few simple solutions that will help with humidity. For example, some plants are excellent for absorbing excess humidity in the air.
You could also try making a DIY dehumidifier:
4. UV Light Damage
As wonderful as sunlight is, it has a few not-so-pleasant consequences. We all know about the threats of skin cancer from UV rays, but they can also do some damage indoors as they shine in through windows. UV rays penetrate the glass of your home and can beam down on a piece of art, furniture, a rug, or any other furnishings in your home resulting in a bleaching or yellowing affect. As a general rule, soft furnishings will lose their color vibrancy after prolonged UV exposure, while paper and canvas will yellow.
The easiest way to do this, of course, is just to draw your curtains or lower your blinds. Summer is meant to be bright and sunny however, and you don’t want to miss out on enjoying your home being filled with natural light!
A great solution is to use UV window film. These films are able to block the majority of UV light from penetrating your windows but they don’t block the visible light. So your interior will still be bright and beautiful, but without the harmful UV rays that can cause such damage to your interior decor. Window film can also be helpful for people with Lupus or other UV light sensitivity issues (May is Lupus awareness month. (Gently) hug a friend with Lupus!)
5. Unpleasant odors
Fresh summer rains, the smell of the salt and surf, savory foods on the grill and the scent of honeysuckle or magnolia blossoms wafting through the air…these are just some of the wonderful scents of summer! Nevertheless there can be some rather unpleasant odors due to high summer temperatures, especially in the kitchen. The warmer the weather is, the quicker odor-inducing bacteria can spread resulting in unpleasant smells throughout your home. The best way to prevent this issue is to dispose of all trash as quickly as possible. This is especially true for food waste items; you should either dispose of them in a garbage disposal or start composting. If you’re concerned that composting will just transfer the odors outside, there are some things can do to ensure that your compost doesn’t have an unpleasant odor.
The other potential source of smells is clothing, and especially your laundry basket. As it’s not economical (or good for the environment) to run a wash every time you have an item that needs washing, you might want to consider making these DIY deodorizer pouches and adding a few to your laundry basket. Just make sure that you remove the pouches prior to washing!
While there may be some summer problems for your home and garden, the ideas above can help ensure that you have a summer to remember for all the right reasons! To end this post on a positive note, check out this list of 100 Things To Do This Summer. Actually there are 200 ideas to try!
Let the summer fun begin!
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