After trapping nearly a dozen, Texas woman buys a new house to escape weekly scorpions

After seeing scorpions around her North Texas home week after week, one homeowner said the problem became bad enough that she chose to move.

What's happening?

According to a report from WFAA, Tanesha Jones said one aspect of moving from Chicago to Frisco, Texas, caught her completely by surprise: scorpions lurking near her home's doors and eventually making their way inside.

She said she had expected "maybe a bit of southern culture shock" after the move, not repeated encounters with stinging pests. She responded by placing sticky traps near the front door and the doors connected to her garage.

Over a period of months, Jones told the outlet that the traps caught around a dozen scorpions. The repeated sightings were frequent enough to change how she felt about living there.

The surge may be connected to seasonal conditions. Ashley Morgan-Olvera of the Texas Invasive Species Institute said the wetter summer had brought out more "creepy crawlies" around North Texas homes, per WFAA, and that the striped bark scorpions Jones was finding were likely nesting in the mulch near her front door.

Landscaping choices, moisture, and neighborhood development can create inviting hiding places for animals that might otherwise remain out of sight.

Why does it matter?

This kind of encounter can be more than unsettling. Scorpions can trigger fear, sleepless nights, and costly pest-control efforts, especially when they begin appearing in entryways, garages, or living spaces. While most scorpion venom isn't fatal to humans, their stings can cause painful, itchy marks and be a nuisance for people. 

With wetter weather helping more pests flourish, homeowners may be dealing with more than simple discomfort.

In Jones's case, the first response was practical: sticky traps at key entrances. That kind of barrier will not solve the broader issue. 

Scorpions play an important role in their ecosystems by helping control insect populations, and while most homeowners would rather keep them outside, there are effective, nonlethal ways to prevent them from entering the home.

Sealing gaps under doors, reducing debris near entry points, and contacting a pest-control professional if sightings continue can lower the risk of incursions, especially during wetter periods that can temporarily increase pest activity.

For Jones, the sightings had already become more than she wanted to keep managing.

"I usually see one a week, one or two a week," Jones told WFAA. In the end, she decided, "I bought a new house, I'm moving. I can't take it."

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