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Editorial policy

This page explains how a guide gets from a question to a published page, and what we will and won’t do along the way.

How we pick topics

We start from questions people actually ask about household pests. Closely related questions go on one page with subheadings, rather than many thin pages. Each guide should answer its question in the first two sentences, then give the detail.

Which sources we use

We use the highest-quality source available, in this order:

  1. Federal and state agencies, such as the EPA, the CDC, the National Pesticide Information Center and state health departments.
  2. University extension and integrated pest management (IPM) programs.
  3. Peer-reviewed research.
  4. Product labels, for what a specific product is approved to do.

We do not use pest control company blogs, other content sites, AI tools or Wikipedia as the source for a fact. Every number on a page links to where it came from.

How a guide is written and reviewed

  1. Brief. An editor sets the question, the sources to check and what the reader needs to be able to do afterward.
  2. Draft. A writer drafts the guide. AI tools may help with outlines and first drafts (details).
  3. Fact-check. An editor opens every cited source and confirms each claim and number, including the title, description and image text. Anything unsupported is removed.
  4. Safety check. Pesticide and safety steps must match the label and agency guidance, and say when to call a licensed professional.
  5. Expert review. A pest control professional reads the guide, corrects it and adds first-hand input in their own words. Guides that cover pesticides or treatments are reviewed only by a licensed professional; practical guides on signs, identification and prevention may be reviewed by an experienced expert contributor. Only after they approve it in writing do we show “Reviewed by” with their name and the date.
  6. Publish and maintain. We show the published date and, after review, the last reviewed date. We re-check guides at least every 12 months, or sooner when a source changes.

“Expert review in progress”

Some guides are published after the editor fact-check but before expert review. Those pages say “Expert review in progress” at the top. We never show a placeholder reviewer, and we never mark a page reviewed without a named, verifiable professional.

First-hand information

We add first-hand material where we have it: input from our reviewers, photos we or our reviewers took (with permission and a caption saying who took them), and step-by-step checks you can run in your own home. We do not use AI-generated images of pests, pest damage or people, and we do not present stock photos as our own.

Dates

We change the updated date only when the content changes in a meaningful way. We do not change dates to make a page look newer.

Guest articles are held to the same standards as our own and are edited by our team. Any article or link that was paid for is labeled “Sponsored”, and paid links carry rel="sponsored". See Contribute.

How we use AI

We use AI tools to help with research outlines and first drafts. Every guide is then rewritten and fact-checked by our editors against the linked sources. AI is never listed as an author. Full details: How we use AI.