@Kidsandliz I agree! You’ll be outside then suddenly blood is running down the back of your neck. You don’t feel them bite but you certainly feel them later, burns and itches like a son-of-a-gun.
@2many2no I mean, depends on your definition of bug. The actual scientific bug is like, a certain amount of specific beetles. colloquially I’d say any insect or arachnid is a bug
@chienfou Well, yeah - I know that, I suppose I should have worded it more precisely. I still think they transmit more diseases in more places than the other things mentioned.
Also, who is the butt hole who voted butterflies better yet who’s responsible for even adding that to the list. They are nature’s non lethal insect that helps pollinate to promote nature’s spring.
@xedrothi In Wisconsin we had horse flies and deer flies, so while you were trying to get that deer fly untangled from your hair where it was biting into your scalp, one of those lumbering horse flies would come by and get you on the leg or arm. We would go through cases of OFF in the summer.
@llangley interesting. I would love for it to be something that qualifies as “beneficial” but I don’t think this is that. Longer antennae and a small waist. I’m afraid it’s a carpenter ant looking for a new colony. This one is in the house, and not in groups. Doesn’t really fly.
I cannot believe nobody mentioned COCKROACHES – bad in the south, bad in the north, bad in …
I hate those damn things – the main bug I feel exactly zero remorse for killing on sight. Worse inside the house than out; you cannot say that about those other insects.
Mosquitoes are in second place, but at least I can shelter in place from them, if I keep the doors closed.
I also hate when my house smells like HotShot, Raid, or whatever, but I will pay that price.
According to the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), cockroaches carry bacteria that, if deposited on food, can cause salmonella, staphylococcus, and streptococcus.
According to the World Health organization (WHO), cockroaches have been known to play a role as carriers of intestinal diseases, such as dysentery, diarrhea, cholera, and typhoid"
@phendrick@ShotgunX While cockroach is bad, the mosquito is worse. Malaria, zika, etc., etc. And cockroaches you can get rid of with some work. Mosquitos are always lurking.
@phendrick Get cats. Roaches are cat toys. They only try to eat them once, but they will still kill them playing with them. One night I woke up in the middle of the night trying to figure out what was going on with a cat being an asshole running around my bed, jumping off and then jumping back on. The cat was carefully playing with a roach. It would manage to get off the bed, she’d go after it, carefully pick it up in her mouth, put it back on the bed… rinse and repeat. I grabbed it bare handed and threw it out the window. Cat was pissed at me. Usually though I’ll find dead ones. Actually it only took 11 months to get rid of them all (except for a stray one here and there on rare occasion - likely comes in under the door) where I live now. Makes me very happy.
@Kidsandliz I have cats. They don’t seem to care. (Maybe I should quit feeding them? Would that make them more interested?) And they tend to be outnumbered.
My biggest predator of roaches is spiders. I try to carry on a truce with them, as long as they don’t decorate my corners with webs too much. I hate spraying for roaches, knowing that is probably also killing the spiders.
@mediocrebot Yeah seriously. Somewhere a while back I posted a photo here of the front of my car that looked like it was a total wall of love bugs. Thank god for those water pressure pipes they have in the turnpike rest areas. I’d have to pull off at every one of them just to clean off the windshield.
I used to take adjudicated youth canoeing across the state of FL and fire ant hills could be knee high. And there were tons of them. Fortunately if you accidentally sat down without, for example, seeing one on the other side of the tree (she speaks from experience) you could run to the water (the hell with the gaitors and cottonmouths and water moccasins in there) to get them off by drowning them. Of course by then you have tons of bites that sting like hell.
@mehcuda67 If you would like 2 recipes for cooking spiders I can give you the ones I got from my daughter. I then asked her if she told me about this because she wanted spiders for dinner (wondering how I’d tell PetSmart or Petco that I wanted their biggest and juiciest tarantula and no tarantula food). Fortunately for me she said, “Spider no good mom. In this country we have chicken.”.
Of course one day early on she came home having caught a wasp by the wings and was expecting me to put it in dinner.
And then there was the time I showed her Angeline Jolie’d and son Maddox’s spider dinner in Cambodia. She said, “Poor Cambodians are very smart mom. They trick the stupid foreigners into thinking spider is what rich people eat instead of just the poor people who have to eat them because they don’t have a choice.”.
But I can tell you how to stir fry them or stick cook them. Just let me know.
@Kidsandliz Wow, perspective makes all the difference. It’s one thing to eat bugs for novelty. It’s another thing to do it because you have to.
(And catching a wasp by the wings - I am impressed!)
Whenever you start getting too smug about having a cell phone, think about how we can’t genocide mosquitos. We can’t even avoid mosquitos. Who’s really running this planet?
Yeah, Mosquitoes, Cockroaches…
What about Fire Ants? Not just regular ants, these guys are aggressive biters. And they coordinate in swarms by use of pheromones. You aren’t crazy, they all do bite at about the same time; they did a 3-2-1 GO!
I flip-flopped between mosquito and gnat. I think a gnat is more annoying than a mosquito, but it is relatively harmless, while mosquitoes bite and can even kill you in extreme cases. I also think a single gnat is more annoying than a mosquito because you can kill one mosquito relatively simply. Gnats are much harder to kill
tl;dr
1 gnat is more annoying than 1 mosquito
swarm of mosquitoes more annoying than swarm of gnats
It’s the whine, combined with repeat biting
@simplersimon Why did you have to bring my ex-wife into this?
Cave crickets
Deer flies
@Grumman I hate them, and they’ll take a chunk out of you, but as for annoying, the mosquito wins for ability to bite unnoticed, and that whine.
@Grumman One of the trails I ride here has a bunch of them. They swoop in from behind and bite the hell out of my legs.
@Grumman shoot i was thinking Chinese beetle but yeah those are annoying and they suck blood.
black flies in, say, northern MN or Canada or all the other places they have swarms of them.
@Kidsandliz bad, but at least where I am, we always have more mosquitos, and the flies are less stealthy in landing, and less noisy in flight.
@simplersimon It certainly can be a tie between mossies, black flies and no seeums up north when camping.
@Kidsandliz I agree! You’ll be outside then suddenly blood is running down the back of your neck. You don’t feel them bite but you certainly feel them later, burns and itches like a son-of-a-gun.
I think I started another thread with this topic, since this one was not up yet, as far as I could tell. I said:
Software bugs are the most annoying, but I don’t like mosquitos much either.
The one in our Alexa that listens to us all the time… that we freaking bought! Really, we bugged ourselves. Worst freaking bug.
Deer Flies (delta-winged demons) AND Blackflies (blood-lapping hover bugs)
Technically, not a bug…
But friggin’ chiggers!
@2many2no Came here to bring up chiggers if nobody had yet. Tiny little demon spawn.
@2many2no I mean, depends on your definition of bug. The actual scientific bug is like, a certain amount of specific beetles. colloquially I’d say any insect or arachnid is a bug
@spitfire6006006 They’re not insects, they’re mite larvae.
Still the itchiest things out there. At least they don’t carry disease in America.
@2many2no right, but they are arachnid
Mosquitoes can kill you - Zika virus, West Nile virus, Chikungunya virus, dengue, and malaria. We’ve had West Nile around here.
@Kyeh
So can bees, deer flies, horse flies etc. due to anaphalaxis. Technically it’s not the mosquito that kills you. They are just a vector.
@chienfou Well, yeah - I know that, I suppose I should have worded it more precisely. I still think they transmit more diseases in more places than the other things mentioned.
@chienfou @Kyeh
Technically people don’t kill other people. They are just vectors.
@chienfou @DVDBZN @Kyeh Who you callin’ a vector?
/giphy vectrex
@DVDBZN @Kyeh
No that’s not how a vector works… Unless you mean HIV, TB. Ebola etc
As a resident of a shit-stained urban mega-center, I will say: bedbugs.
The one up my ass.
Stinkbugs, but I’ve never seen a bedbug
Im shocked nobody mentioned chinese beetle.
Also, who is the butt hole who voted butterflies better yet who’s responsible for even adding that to the list. They are nature’s non lethal insect that helps pollinate to promote nature’s spring.
@whomeyesu Bumble bees are only slightly behind, too. Carpenter bees or sweat bees, sure. But bumble bees? They’re calm enough you can pet them.
@smyle You are correct and spot on sparky.
Horse flies are #1 on my shit list right now, mainly because I was bit by one a week ago and the wound is still lingering.
They may be loud and stupid but they can be pretty slick when they’re out for your blood.
@xedrothi In Wisconsin we had horse flies and deer flies, so while you were trying to get that deer fly untangled from your hair where it was biting into your scalp, one of those lumbering horse flies would come by and get you on the leg or arm. We would go through cases of OFF in the summer.
And few things are worse than lying in bed and hearing a mosquito in the room … somewhere.
The ones I write that QA finds. Or worse, the ones customers find.
Effing Ants
What the…does nobody here have yellow jackets?
/image know your bees
Well, the one I was hoping for says a-hole with wings but that will have to do
@tweezak I have twice disturbed a yellow jacket nest while hiking. Let’s just say you don’t want to do that unless wearing a space suit.
Ticks
@katbyter Yeah that is true. I got lyme disease from one a couple of years ago.
@rtjhnstn
This is the one that has been terrorizing us this year. Every year it’s something new. This year it’s this.
@katbyter maybe the minute black scavenger fly?
http://www.missouribotanicalgarden.org/gardens-gardening/your-garden/help-for-the-home-gardener/advice-tips-resources/pests-and-problems/other/beneficial-insects.aspx
@llangley interesting. I would love for it to be something that qualifies as “beneficial” but I don’t think this is that. Longer antennae and a small waist. I’m afraid it’s a carpenter ant looking for a new colony. This one is in the house, and not in groups. Doesn’t really fly.
I cannot believe nobody mentioned COCKROACHES – bad in the south, bad in the north, bad in …
I hate those damn things – the main bug I feel exactly zero remorse for killing on sight. Worse inside the house than out; you cannot say that about those other insects.
Mosquitoes are in second place, but at least I can shelter in place from them, if I keep the doors closed.
I also hate when my house smells like HotShot, Raid, or whatever, but I will pay that price.
/image cockroaches
/giphy cockroaches
@phendrick While nasty, at least they’re not particularly dangerous.
@ShotgunX
https://www.healthline.com/health/are-cockroaches-dangerous#disease-carriers
"Cockroaches and disease
Although there’s little evidence linking cockroaches and specific disease outbreaks, cockroaches can carry bacteria.
According to the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), cockroaches carry bacteria that, if deposited on food, can cause salmonella, staphylococcus, and streptococcus.
According to the World Health organization (WHO), cockroaches have been known to play a role as carriers of intestinal diseases, such as dysentery, diarrhea, cholera, and typhoid"
@phendrick @ShotgunX While cockroach is bad, the mosquito is worse. Malaria, zika, etc., etc. And cockroaches you can get rid of with some work. Mosquitos are always lurking.
@phendrick Get cats. Roaches are cat toys. They only try to eat them once, but they will still kill them playing with them. One night I woke up in the middle of the night trying to figure out what was going on with a cat being an asshole running around my bed, jumping off and then jumping back on. The cat was carefully playing with a roach. It would manage to get off the bed, she’d go after it, carefully pick it up in her mouth, put it back on the bed… rinse and repeat. I grabbed it bare handed and threw it out the window. Cat was pissed at me. Usually though I’ll find dead ones. Actually it only took 11 months to get rid of them all (except for a stray one here and there on rare occasion - likely comes in under the door) where I live now. Makes me very happy.
@ShotgunX @zinimusprime Yeah, but I can keep mosquitoes out of my life, meaning out of my house, a lot easier than I can keep roaches out.
@Kidsandliz I have cats. They don’t seem to care. (Maybe I should quit feeding them? Would that make them more interested?) And they tend to be outnumbered.
My biggest predator of roaches is spiders. I try to carry on a truce with them, as long as they don’t decorate my corners with webs too much. I hate spraying for roaches, knowing that is probably also killing the spiders.
@phendrick @ShotgunX you are correct, they are easier to keep out.
/giphy touche
@phendrick It’s only my young ones that play with them.
Just a quick shout out to Murder Hornets…
@katbyter The best part about this is the flying panda.
Just wait til the rest of you get the Spotted Lanternfly spread.
@cinoclav They are horrible. We got a bug a salt rifle which makes killing them more entertaining.
@callow @cinoclav Love mine. I’m actually happy if a fly gets in the house. Puts a momentary dent in Covid boredom.
Wasps. They’re pure fucking evil that only exist to attack. They’re like air sharks, only more so.
Box Elder Bug. Fairly harmless, but some years they decide to spawn in massive number, and they get everywhere.
/image Box Elder Bug
volkswagen Beetle.
No Seeums
@musmagic Seriously. When I get a bite, I’m thinking “At least show yourself, you little bastard. Even mosquitos have the decency to do that!”
I’m in Florida. For me it’s a tie between love bugs and fire ants…
@mediocrebot Yeah seriously. Somewhere a while back I posted a photo here of the front of my car that looked like it was a total wall of love bugs. Thank god for those water pressure pipes they have in the turnpike rest areas. I’d have to pull off at every one of them just to clean off the windshield.
I used to take adjudicated youth canoeing across the state of FL and fire ant hills could be knee high. And there were tons of them. Fortunately if you accidentally sat down without, for example, seeing one on the other side of the tree (she speaks from experience) you could run to the water (the hell with the gaitors and cottonmouths and water moccasins in there) to get them off by drowning them. Of course by then you have tons of bites that sting like hell.
@Kidsandliz @mediocrebot
and then turn into nasty looking blisters/pustules
@chienfou Yup. They do that too. And when you are camping often get infected. Now I get cellulitis every single time I get stung by one. Sucks.
Of the options, I chose gnats because I can’t stand how they get in my eyes. I’m completely freaked out by silverfish though
KuoH
@kuoh
Now that’s a “duhhh” statement!
Why is there no option for “All of them”?
Also, fleas.
@ahacksaw FLEAS! Absolutely!
The 17 year locusts are pretty nasty the year they come out. Crunching anywhere you walk, preferably not in bare feet.
@Kidsandliz and so damn big and freaky looking and loud!
@Jeffta311 @Kidsandliz But at least you could fry them up and eat them.
@mehcuda67 If you would like 2 recipes for cooking spiders I can give you the ones I got from my daughter. I then asked her if she told me about this because she wanted spiders for dinner (wondering how I’d tell PetSmart or Petco that I wanted their biggest and juiciest tarantula and no tarantula food). Fortunately for me she said, “Spider no good mom. In this country we have chicken.”.
Of course one day early on she came home having caught a wasp by the wings and was expecting me to put it in dinner.
And then there was the time I showed her Angeline Jolie’d and son Maddox’s spider dinner in Cambodia. She said, “Poor Cambodians are very smart mom. They trick the stupid foreigners into thinking spider is what rich people eat instead of just the poor people who have to eat them because they don’t have a choice.”.
But I can tell you how to stir fry them or stick cook them. Just let me know.
@Kidsandliz Wow, perspective makes all the difference. It’s one thing to eat bugs for novelty. It’s another thing to do it because you have to.
(And catching a wasp by the wings - I am impressed!)
Whenever you start getting too smug about having a cell phone, think about how we can’t genocide mosquitos. We can’t even avoid mosquitos. Who’s really running this planet?
Black flies.
@duce_ Yes the clouds of them are miserable.
Yeah, Mosquitoes, Cockroaches…
What about Fire Ants? Not just regular ants, these guys are aggressive biters. And they coordinate in swarms by use of pheromones. You aren’t crazy, they all do bite at about the same time; they did a 3-2-1 GO!
@rockblossom Yeah, that would be annoying at a picnic.
I flip-flopped between mosquito and gnat. I think a gnat is more annoying than a mosquito, but it is relatively harmless, while mosquitoes bite and can even kill you in extreme cases. I also think a single gnat is more annoying than a mosquito because you can kill one mosquito relatively simply. Gnats are much harder to kill
tl;dr
1 gnat is more annoying than 1 mosquito
swarm of mosquitoes more annoying than swarm of gnats