If you live in Florida, you have probably experienced some damage to your home due to hurricanes, especially water damage. Mold also likes to start growing in homes that have been water damaged after hurricanes and other storms, especially since Florida is characterized by warm and moist weather. Mold can start to grow in these homes after about 48 hours, so it’s important to get any standing water in the home removed and the home dried out as soon as possible.
A large amount of all the buildings in Florida have to deal with some kind of water or mold damage and a lot of the time this is due to the frequent hurricanes that hit the state almost every single year. The electricity goes down and people are not able to use their air conditioners to help air out and dry the home. Air conditioners can also help to remove humidity by keeping the house at a certain temperature.
If you want to have a healthy and safe indoor environment to live in, you need to make sure your air conditioner is properly serviced as often as is necessary. If it is an old system and has a lot of problems, it is probably best to just replace it instead of doing work on it repeatedly.
Sometimes indoor air quality tests need to be done and not just in Florida. Mold testing should be done and while it’s become a multi-million dollar business industry, it is a necessary one. Mold has been proved to be very harmful to human (and animal) health. When you choose a company to do mold testing or remediation keep it in mind not to choose the same company to do both for you. If a company does both mold testing and removal, it is in their best interest for them to find mold on your property, so even if they say there is mold there, it might not be.
Make sure they have the latest technology in mold testing such as infrared thermal cameras, mold spore counters, air moisture meters, and etcetera. The company should also have a microbiologist in house and certified mold inspectors.
They should inspect the air conditioner, the exterior, plumbing, and they should perform moisture tests around the whole house.
You should do these things even if you do not live in Florida, but a large part of the state of Florida is at risk for water and mold damage because of the moisture and humidity that can exist there.
Jim Corkern is a writer and promoter of quality
North Carolina Mold Remediation and other states such as
New Jersey Sewage Damage Cleanup companies across the united states.
Saturday, September 29, 2007
Saturday, September 8, 2007
Home Canned Food and Mold
Most of us like homegrown and prepared food, but sometimes when we can them in glass containers when we have too much garden produce to eat or too much to just give away, it does not all go according to plan. There are some tried and true canning techniques that have been in use in the past century or more, but sometimes we forget to use common sense when we are canning and this can lead to mold contamination in our food that we worked so hard to prepare and preserve.
We like to can our own food because we know exactly what chemicals and pesticides are going into it. Most of us do not like the idea of chemicals being put onto our food, even if they are deemed “safe” by the government or FDA. Sometimes the chemicals that they say are safe today are not safe tomorrow. But, mold contamination can be just as dangerous as any pesticide or preservative and there are a few things that you can do as a home canner to prevent this from happening to your canned items.
Make sure that the fruits and vegetables that you are canning are of the best quality from your garden. If they have any bad spots on them, cut these off or simply do not can them. Fruits and vegetables need to be washed and some need to be peeled before you can them. Starting with good quality ingredients is key.
Do not pack the food too tightly into the jars that you will can them in. The food in the center does not get to the high temperature that it needs to in order to kill bacteria and mold spores. You should pack food loosely, with at least a few inches from the top of the jar, depending on the size that you are canning in.
After you fill the jars, put the lids and the bands on. Start processing the food immediately so that mold and bacteria do not have a chance to start growing. If mold spores get into the jar, you might have a problem, because sometimes high temperatures just do not kill mold spores. Make sure any equipment that you use is completely sterile.
If you do happen to find mold growing in a jar after you open it, just throw it away. Foods that have a high amount of moisture are not salvageable when they become contaminated.
Jim Corkern is a writer and promoter of quality
flood water damage restoration New Jersey and and other states such as
Connecticut Water Damage Restoration companies across the united states.
We like to can our own food because we know exactly what chemicals and pesticides are going into it. Most of us do not like the idea of chemicals being put onto our food, even if they are deemed “safe” by the government or FDA. Sometimes the chemicals that they say are safe today are not safe tomorrow. But, mold contamination can be just as dangerous as any pesticide or preservative and there are a few things that you can do as a home canner to prevent this from happening to your canned items.
Make sure that the fruits and vegetables that you are canning are of the best quality from your garden. If they have any bad spots on them, cut these off or simply do not can them. Fruits and vegetables need to be washed and some need to be peeled before you can them. Starting with good quality ingredients is key.
Do not pack the food too tightly into the jars that you will can them in. The food in the center does not get to the high temperature that it needs to in order to kill bacteria and mold spores. You should pack food loosely, with at least a few inches from the top of the jar, depending on the size that you are canning in.
After you fill the jars, put the lids and the bands on. Start processing the food immediately so that mold and bacteria do not have a chance to start growing. If mold spores get into the jar, you might have a problem, because sometimes high temperatures just do not kill mold spores. Make sure any equipment that you use is completely sterile.
If you do happen to find mold growing in a jar after you open it, just throw it away. Foods that have a high amount of moisture are not salvageable when they become contaminated.
Jim Corkern is a writer and promoter of quality
flood water damage restoration New Jersey and and other states such as
Connecticut Water Damage Restoration companies across the united states.
General Rules For Mold Testing Kits
If you are unfortunate enough to have to test your home for mold, you are probably thinking that this is going to be a pretty inconvenient thing to have to do. Well, it might not be fun to think that you have disease-causing mold living in your house, but doing the actual test to determine if it exists is not really that hard to conduct at all. Whatever kind of test kit you end up using, the directions on the package must be followed to the exact letter or you will probably render the test useless. There are a few quite general rules that you should follow to get the most out of your testing kits.
If you can see the mold growing in your wall, ceilings, carpet, or on anything else in the home, you do not really have to do any guesswork as to whether you need to test the home or not. If you see anything like this, do not only test that room; test your entire home. Every room needs to be tested and this includes the ventilation system, because it extends to every room in the house and if mold is growing in the vents, it will spread to the rest of the house.
Run the air conditioner or fans in every room in your home before you put out the test kits so that if there are any mold spores in the room, they will be stirred up into the air and will settle down in the kit. Do not set them up anywhere high; a coffee table or somewhere around the mid to low level of the room should be fine. If you set them up too high, you may not get a good sample.
If there happens to be mold growing visibly on anything, you can use a piece of scotch tape to lift the mold up off the surface and place it into the test kit. There is a method that you can use involving scraping some of the mold into the kit with a knife, but since this can stir up mold spores even more, unless you are wearing a respirator, you are probably better off using the tape method.
To test the ventilation system, the best thing that you can do is tape a test against the grill of one of the ventilation ducts so that the air coming out of it is hitting the testing kit at a 90 degree angle. This will allow you to get the maximum amount of exposure.
Jim Corkern is a writer and respected contributor to the Water damage restoration and mold remediation Industry. Visit his sites for more information.
http://www.floodchicago.info
http://www.damagewatersc.info
If you can see the mold growing in your wall, ceilings, carpet, or on anything else in the home, you do not really have to do any guesswork as to whether you need to test the home or not. If you see anything like this, do not only test that room; test your entire home. Every room needs to be tested and this includes the ventilation system, because it extends to every room in the house and if mold is growing in the vents, it will spread to the rest of the house.
Run the air conditioner or fans in every room in your home before you put out the test kits so that if there are any mold spores in the room, they will be stirred up into the air and will settle down in the kit. Do not set them up anywhere high; a coffee table or somewhere around the mid to low level of the room should be fine. If you set them up too high, you may not get a good sample.
If there happens to be mold growing visibly on anything, you can use a piece of scotch tape to lift the mold up off the surface and place it into the test kit. There is a method that you can use involving scraping some of the mold into the kit with a knife, but since this can stir up mold spores even more, unless you are wearing a respirator, you are probably better off using the tape method.
To test the ventilation system, the best thing that you can do is tape a test against the grill of one of the ventilation ducts so that the air coming out of it is hitting the testing kit at a 90 degree angle. This will allow you to get the maximum amount of exposure.
Jim Corkern is a writer and respected contributor to the Water damage restoration and mold remediation Industry. Visit his sites for more information.
http://www.floodchicago.info
http://www.damagewatersc.info
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