With incense coils to prevent encounters when possible, and with horror movie shrill hollers when prevention fails… I’ll defend my screams with a fun fact about my nemesis: cockroaches can move 50 body lengths per SECOND. It would be like you taking off into a sprint and immediately moving at over 200 miles per hour. Most other bugs get the live and let live approach… except of course bloodsucking mosquitoes.
@chienfou@jouest@macromeh@yakkoTDI
So do you not have any pictures on your walls, or decorative objects in your house? Cats are - if nothing else - a thing of beauty! But they’re also funny, warm, cuddly … at least all of mine have been.
@capnjb You must have a lot of holes in your walls.
I’m not afraid of spiders - I don’t want them in my house, but I do like @Cerridwyn, catch and release.
Black Widow that was just sitting in the middle of the dining room floor.
One evening as we were falling asleep, I felt my wife tickle my hand. But then my brain told me my wife was lying on her side with her back to me. That was not her hand.
I jumped out of bed and flipped on the lights to find a spider that was maybe 5" wide on the bed with my wife. The spider looked at me and said screw this and went to hide under the sheets with my wife. I couldn’t let that happen so as it scrambled to get under the same covers as my wife, I grabbed it and threw it across the room.
Meanwhile, my wife is waking up and looking at me like I’m some sort of asshole. Mind you, this is like just after midnight.
Now the spider and I are squaring off in the middle of the bedroom. I grab a Calvin and Hobbes comic book and toss it at the spider like a perfect cornhole toss. Book lands directly on the spider so I begin to do an Irish jig on the book as my finishing move to end the spider.
My wife still hasn’t figured out what is going on, so there is just me, in my underwear dancing on a comic book with the lights on in the middle of the night. She’s pissed at me and in my head I’m just thinking ‘You have no idea the bullet I just took for you’
I won’t get into the time she chased a rattlesnake out of the garden
@werehatrack That is some Winston Churchill shit right there
We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender.
@heartny glue boards, which fold into open ended boxes are amazingly effective. You might not think you have bugs or other creepy crawlies, but put down a bunch of glue board near the baseboards around your house and check them in a week or so. You will be sore amazed.
I use Catchmaster boards, which I replace every few months around the house, particularly the basement. They are always loaded with insects every time I pick up an old one to replace it with a fresh board.
Fold them up so that pets are less likely to get stuck. If that happens, a pet can be freed from the glue with vegetable oil and a bit of patience.
Boric acid and better yet, diatomaceous earth (not the kind for swimming pool filters) are also effective against most bugs, in particular any with a hard chitin exoskeleton. The diatomaceous earth, which is non toxic, is composed of the ancient fossils of diatoms, microscopic sea creatures of long, long ago. These microscopic shards scratch the shells of the insects and cause them to lose moisture and expire.
I have long maintained that if builders would take the extra 20 minutes to puff a bit of diatomaceous earth inside wall cavities, the home owners would see many, many less bugs.
But we know how careless the vast majority of builders and their workers are, so it ain’t gonna happen.
One can also spray puffs of diatomaceous earth on the garden and it will help to cut down on the voracious pests that feed on your plants. In particular, anyone who has tried to grow eggplant (aubergine) knows how flea beetles can destroy the leaves and stunt the plants. Puff those leaves with diatomaceous earth, and don’t forget to reapply after a rain.
@Jackinga
I’ve had pretty good luck with the Ichiban (Japanese style) variety and so far no trouble with flea beetles… squash bugs on the other hand
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Bifen xts. It’s the oil based version of the stuff in ortho. I spray the perimeter of the house and up the siding/base a foot. Some other spider/wasp/mosquito Hangouts.
Wasps nest on my deck/corners. Spiders.
Maybe garage interior. Around the doors. Windows. Don’t want to walk into a spider web.
Mosquito dunks into standing water/ponds.
That does it mostly.
I have had one of these going near litter box for a year but this one is no longer sold. But it’s zapped a good bit.
My favorite way of getting house flies is with a spray bottle full of water. As long as the nozzle has a wide dispersion, it’s usually not too hard to hit a fly which, with wet wings, drops to the floor for easy pickup and disposal.
I do like my electric tennis-racket-sized fly swatter too.
@blaineg The bug-a-salt is the best bang for the buck in turning an annoyance into entertainment.
Also very popular for the grandkids. The only awkward part is if company is over and one of my grandkids spots a bug and shouts “Granddaddy, get the gun!”
Unfortunately it doesn’t do anything to tougher bugs like yellow jackets, stink bugs and beetles.
@blaineg@mehcuda67 I have a Bug-a-Salt. I have been sadly disappointed as it is ineffective on the bugs I want to kill the most, viz., palmetto bugs.
I never saw one of those roaches on steroids, which are the state bird of Flor-rid-duh, until recent years. With global warming, they are now prevalent in our area, along with army-dillers aka possum on the half-shell (that’s another story).
I put some of those ultra high frequency screamers around the house, but I don’t think the bugs notice as much as I had hoped.
Made me feel guilty though when one of the granddawgs came to visit, I shoudda remembered to unplug 'em. I don’t know if it bother the dog. I hope not.
@Jackinga@mehcuda67 Well you could up your arsenal. A shotgun is probably inadvisable, but they make .22 shot shells. They’ve been effective against rattlesnakes.
With everything you’ve got!
KuoH
@kuoh Taken from another thread…
With a cup and a paper plate so I can put them outside
@Cerridwyn and here i am fumbling with hands
@jouest
well they are just doing their bit for the ecosystem. Living their little bug lives
@Cerridwyn With spiders and stinkbugs, sure. Mosquitoes, moths, wasps, centipedes, ants - no.
However I use a couple of different plug-in sonic bug repellers and rarely see bugs inside.
@aetris Moths are cool! They pollinate too! And they are fuzzy!
@aetris I’ll give you the answer. I don’t put them outside the rest I would
@Cerridwyn Good luck with that, a party size salad bowl and serving tray might be more appropriate.
KuoH
@Cerridwyn @jouest I have a neighbor named Cerridwen. She’s beautiful.
@Bernoulli @jouest Tell her happy Beltane
And she spells it ‘correctly’
@Bernoulli @Cerridwyn @jouest Y?
A plastic hairbrush. Very lethal, very lightweight.
@Wollyhop savage
With incense coils to prevent encounters when possible, and with horror movie shrill hollers when prevention fails… I’ll defend my screams with a fun fact about my nemesis: cockroaches can move 50 body lengths per SECOND. It would be like you taking off into a sprint and immediately moving at over 200 miles per hour. Most other bugs get the live and let live approach… except of course bloodsucking mosquitoes.
I haz cats…
@chienfou me too, but apparently worthless ones…
@chienfou @jouest Is there any other kind?
@chienfou @jouest @macromeh Nope. That’s why they are so valuable.
@chienfou @jouest @macromeh @yakkoTDI
So do you not have any pictures on your walls, or decorative objects in your house? Cats are - if nothing else - a thing of beauty! But they’re also funny, warm, cuddly … at least all of mine have been.
Browning 12 gauge. Loud, but the efficacy is unmatched.
@capnjb
@Kyeh You’ve never lived in Florida have you?
The wolf spiders are larger than your hand 
@capnjb You must have a lot of holes in your walls.
I’m not afraid of spiders - I don’t want them in my house, but I do like @Cerridwyn, catch and release.
Black Widow that was just sitting in the middle of the dining room floor.
@capnjb
Spiders, large moths, beetles, wasps - catch & release.
Houseflies - fly swatter.
Fruit flies - homemade vinegar trap.
Mosquitos, gnats, silverfish, clothes & pantry moths - swat & squish.
One evening as we were falling asleep, I felt my wife tickle my hand. But then my brain told me my wife was lying on her side with her back to me. That was not her hand.
I jumped out of bed and flipped on the lights to find a spider that was maybe 5" wide on the bed with my wife. The spider looked at me and said screw this and went to hide under the sheets with my wife. I couldn’t let that happen so as it scrambled to get under the same covers as my wife, I grabbed it and threw it across the room.
Meanwhile, my wife is waking up and looking at me like I’m some sort of asshole.
Mind you, this is like just after midnight.
Now the spider and I are squaring off in the middle of the bedroom. I grab a Calvin and Hobbes comic book and toss it at the spider like a perfect cornhole toss. Book lands directly on the spider so I begin to do an Irish jig on the book as my finishing move to end the spider.
My wife still hasn’t figured out what is going on, so there is just me, in my underwear dancing on a comic book with the lights on in the middle of the night. She’s pissed at me and in my head I’m just thinking ‘You have no idea the bullet I just took for you’
I won’t get into the time she chased a rattlesnake out of the garden
How do I battle them? Mercilessly and unflaggingly, on the ground, in the air, wherever they may attack, I will oppose them and come away victorious.
But don’t ask me to go out into the Everglades in July.
@werehatrack That is some Winston Churchill shit right there
Glue boards. Lots of them. Sometimes boric acid powder.
@heartny glue boards, which fold into open ended boxes are amazingly effective. You might not think you have bugs or other creepy crawlies, but put down a bunch of glue board near the baseboards around your house and check them in a week or so. You will be sore amazed.
I use Catchmaster boards, which I replace every few months around the house, particularly the basement. They are always loaded with insects every time I pick up an old one to replace it with a fresh board.
Fold them up so that pets are less likely to get stuck. If that happens, a pet can be freed from the glue with vegetable oil and a bit of patience.
Boric acid and better yet, diatomaceous earth (not the kind for swimming pool filters) are also effective against most bugs, in particular any with a hard chitin exoskeleton. The diatomaceous earth, which is non toxic, is composed of the ancient fossils of diatoms, microscopic sea creatures of long, long ago. These microscopic shards scratch the shells of the insects and cause them to lose moisture and expire.
I have long maintained that if builders would take the extra 20 minutes to puff a bit of diatomaceous earth inside wall cavities, the home owners would see many, many less bugs.
But we know how careless the vast majority of builders and their workers are, so it ain’t gonna happen.
One can also spray puffs of diatomaceous earth on the garden and it will help to cut down on the voracious pests that feed on your plants. In particular, anyone who has tried to grow eggplant (aubergine) knows how flea beetles can destroy the leaves and stunt the plants. Puff those leaves with diatomaceous earth, and don’t forget to reapply after a rain.
@Jackinga
I’ve had pretty good luck with the Ichiban (Japanese style) variety and so far no trouble with flea beetles… squash bugs on the other hand
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
(Kudos for your choice of using DE).
Bifen xts. It’s the oil based version of the stuff in ortho. I spray the perimeter of the house and up the siding/base a foot. Some other spider/wasp/mosquito Hangouts.
Wasps nest on my deck/corners. Spiders.
Maybe garage interior. Around the doors. Windows. Don’t want to walk into a spider web.
Mosquito dunks into standing water/ponds.
That does it mostly.
I have had one of these going near litter box for a year but this one is no longer sold. But it’s zapped a good bit.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BQ3D4Z9M?ref_=ppx_hzsearch_conn_dt_b_fed_asin_title_1
Meh sold swatter rackets with a battery/plug in dock at one point so those got a lot of gnats/fruit fly types too
These
My favorite way of getting house flies is with a spray bottle full of water. As long as the nozzle has a wide dispersion, it’s usually not too hard to hit a fly which, with wet wings, drops to the floor for easy pickup and disposal.
I do like my electric tennis-racket-sized fly swatter too.
Electric swatter.
@macromeh I’ve got termites. Really the only way.
/image bug-a-salt
@blaineg Or electric flyswatter. Or wasp spray.
@blaineg The bug-a-salt is the best bang for the buck in turning an annoyance into entertainment.
Also very popular for the grandkids. The only awkward part is if company is over and one of my grandkids spots a bug and shouts “Granddaddy, get the gun!”
Unfortunately it doesn’t do anything to tougher bugs like yellow jackets, stink bugs and beetles.
@blaineg @mehcuda67 I have a Bug-a-Salt. I have been sadly disappointed as it is ineffective on the bugs I want to kill the most, viz., palmetto bugs.
I never saw one of those roaches on steroids, which are the state bird of Flor-rid-duh, until recent years. With global warming, they are now prevalent in our area, along with army-dillers aka possum on the half-shell (that’s another story).
I put some of those ultra high frequency screamers around the house, but I don’t think the bugs notice as much as I had hoped.
Made me feel guilty though when one of the granddawgs came to visit, I shoudda remembered to unplug 'em. I don’t know if it bother the dog. I hope not.
@Jackinga @mehcuda67 Well you could up your arsenal. A shotgun is probably inadvisable, but they make .22 shot shells. They’ve been effective against rattlesnakes.