Pestie Profiles

This episode is the first of a series of podcasts where I turn some of my favorite written articles into podcasts. Killing ants you can see is easy!, but killing ants you can't see is the tricky part! So this episode I go through my top ten tips for treating ants to hopefully improve your success rate with managing these challenging critters!

This week we chat to Asita Devi Deo from Fastkil Fiji, winner of Pest Manager of the year- South Pacific category and winner of the women's Excellence award. Running a pest control business with over 50 employees is challenging enough let alone having to do it in Fiji where there is no licensing body or Registered Training Organisations. That is why we see Asita so frequently here in Australia, learning as much as she can to take back and share with her team and the pest management industry in Fiji. We learn all about pest management in Fiji, the type of pests, the type of methods and we soon learn that the challenges are not much different to here in Australia. Asita Devi Deo is an absolute pocket rocket and it is easy to see why she has been recognised with so many awards over the past 10 years and been in business over 20 years!

This episode is we chat to Eliza Urey from Drop Dead Pest Control. Winner of this years PWAPM Administrator of the Year award. Eliza joins the Pestie Profiles Podcast family and gives us an insight into what it's like growing up in the pest management industry and what it's like managing a successful business for her family. We also talk about her thoughts on her first industry conference Pesticon. If you've got kids possibly coming into your business, this is the podcast for you and them!

This episode we chat to Abby Thomas from Pianto Pest Control in Wodonga Victoria. Abby was this years winner of the Professional Women in Australian Pest Managements Female Trainee of the year category. We hear how Abby got into the pest industry, what she loves most about her job, the conference, what winning the award means to her, and of course why this little pocket rocket is so deserving of this award.

This episode we chat to the winners of the 2022 Australian Pest Manager of the Year Micro Business Category, Luke and SueAnn Tysoe from Checkmate Pest Control based on the southside of Brisbane. We hear about why they entered PMOY and what it means to them and it doesn't take long to soon realize why Luke and SueAnn are so deserving of this award! 

Trigger Warning: This podcast contains content that may be harmful or traumatising to some audiences. Mentions bullying, depression, and suicide.

Following on from Pesticon 2022, The Pestie Profiles Podcast will follow on from what was without doubt, the most highlighted and favourite panel session at the conference, WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT MENTAL HEALTH. Those who attended the session were inspired by the bravery and honest discussions by Vasili Tsoutouras, Belinda Smith, and Samuel Wood, on their own experiences with mental health.

As most of you know my absolutely amazing and inspirational co-host and wife, Nicky Turner, has been dealing with some incredibly tough times in her life recently. So, she’s been taking some very much needed down time to process things and get her head back in the game. However, what none of our listeners are probably fully aware of, are the mental struggles Nicky, myself, and our family have endured in particular over the last twelve months.

In this podcast Nicky will be talking about our business Laguna Pest Control, her role as PWAPM president, the impact my cancer diagnosis and treatment had on her, our own personal relationship, and struggles, bullying within the workforce, and finally her own depression, anxiety, and suicidal thoughts.

This episode we continue our chat with Ben Moore all about bees. Ben actually hosts his own podcast https://www.bensbees.com.au/category/podcasts/ and literally lives and breathes everything bee related. This episode is the second installment of a series of episodes Ben and I will produce all about stinging insects. So we will touch on social wasps, solitary wasps, our native bees and of course European Honey Bees. We talk about their ecology, lifecycles, and tips on working with stinging insects. Part 2 sees us really getting into the biology of European Honey Bees and in particular swarming behavior. So if you deal with bees and want to know more this is the podcast for you.