Great mouse story
Ewww on the fly cake
If you knew what goes in restaurants you'd never eat out again
Found some birds that eat stink bugs; Vireos, Wrens, Nuthatches
They're Back - Brown Marmorated Stink Bugs Fall 2012
Yeah Jen, some weeks ago I watched in amazement as some bird roosted on the edge of my back gutter and picked several of the stinks to have as a snack. He very hurriedly ate them then flew away. I hope that when the bugs come back in droves, that the bird will return with all his family and friends.
Ruby
You guys would be SO PROUD of me. I believe that FINALLY I have figured out how to get rid of those stinkers. Wait until Fall, let them congregate in your shed (or whatever), knock them off any surface, and STEP ON THEM.
YIKES! Well, they don't stink so much, it seems, at this time of the year, and they are together so it is easy (all too) to gather them together to make your time worthwhile, and those tears of being totally grossed out, well, if this helps my plague situation, then let my tears fall!
You GO, girl!
How did you encourage them to congregate? Scented candles? Hors d'oeurves?
They congregated naturally, so I stomped naturally! Thanks for the Kudos - I really needed them! Should have seen me stompin' and crying...
I have quite a good imagination...
HAH! Take THAT!! and that! and.... EEEWWwwww - hoo - hoooo... crunch! crunch! stomp! crunch!... ick ick ick icky oooh icky! ewwwwww.... yeeeEE - HAH!
Thanks for the laughs this morning ladies.
Ruby
I won't even tell you my way of getting back of the stink bugs due to the fact that it will incriminate me. Use your imagination LOL.
I saw traps, pheremone lures and light lures (attachment to the trap) at Ace Hardware today. I didn't recall anyone mentioning seeing these.
Thinking of Ruby's problem- well, there were so many around I wonder how well they would be lured to enter the trap. The light idea, I once read worked well in a guy's attic for ones that had entered.
Do you kinow that I saw two live ones yesterday, as cold as it was!!! I haven't been collecting for a few weeks now, but still see a few from time to time. I suspect they are all hidden away in the attic and I will find out this coming weekend as I hope to begin bringing down Christmas decor bins and should find a few of them then. I do know for a fact that they do not freeze. They supposedly have some sort of built in anti-freeze that allows them to live through freezing temperatures. Two years ago when de-cluttering and finally getting out to the shed to declutter things, I was finding live ones during January and February.
Sally, it was a real encouragement when you pointed out that my ridding the place of just one bug will eventually pay off in terms of many thousands that reproduce due to the riddance of the one bug. Let's hope a day comes when this topic won't be necessary.
Ruby
Since you have the attic situation, you might see if John can cut a large soda bottle and assemble a trap.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zKc5acECuQk&NR=1
We've been fortunate this year, the SB population seems to have decreased a bit here, although you'd have trouble convincing my tomatoes of that. We really only had about 1 week that there were a lot trying to get in. That would have been the week before Columbus Day. I had already washed the house around the windows where we had a problem previously, and I used the spray that Ruby said worked on them. I didn't try and spray them directly but sprayed it around the doors and windows as a deterrent. Since the spray (Bengal Gold Roach) is long acting it seemed to be very effective. I found a fair number dead on the sills and sashes. We are finding very few indoors this year. The other thing I did is pull the window AC units before they became thoroughfares for them. Unfortunately the week they were most active was when I was packing for the OBX, later, they were crawling out of hiding places all the way there and for days afterward. I'm hoping the USDA doesn't ban me from interstate travel. LOL Ric
UGH! Today, as I was cleaning the DICKENS outta my kitchen before cooking for Thanksgiving, I, as usual, went overboard and worked myself up to the light above the stovetop, the cover came off all too quickly, and there it was. A stinkbug. Are you grossing out yet? Well, I did enough for ALL. Thought I'd stomped 'em all in the shed...
Oh no! I forgot to tell you this one. Hubby and I went to Gettysburg this past weekend, to watch the Remembrance Day Parade. We'd brought two fabric folding chairs (stored in the shed - BIG HINT), and started unrolling their neat fabric case, and OMG! Those stinkbugs absolutely fell out in waves! YIKES!
Ric - iffn' you develop more eyes on your forehead, you know where they came from...and the USDA will probably say "I told you so!" LOL! Just messin' with you!
Happy Thanksgiving!
Ew Gracye!
My son's loft apt / group bachelor pad has been found to have roaches behind the stove. (Big surprise lol NOT) I am trying not to get too skeeved out about it. And wishing he had stinkbugs instead frankly!
Yep Ric, the Bengal Gold does work but began costing too much for me to continue with any consistency. Yes, many mornings I would step out the back door and find loads of them dead around the door frame. As for them getting near the kitchen stove, that has happened here too. Gross for sure, but just be ultra careful before cooking any thing. I believe the ones I have seen near the stove are coming in from the air vent over the stove.
Sally, we did do the soda bottle and battery operated flame thing a couple of years ago and caught a very few. Just too much work involved with that system it seemed. We too had a lesser number of them this year even though I reported large numbers caught by hand and killed. It was basically during that warm period that Ric spoke of. Since then, a few here and there, but nothing like the first year they arrived about three years ago when they really did a big number of getting inside and behind picture frames on the walls and every thing. I had a lady come for three days who took every thing off the walls, ridded the place of the bugs we saw and washed the walls down. That neither was cheap and I haven't done it since, but thankfully haven't needed to because I will every so often peek behind picture frames and other places we found them that first year and so far, so good.
Those suckers are everywhere.....I have opened car doors and seen them sticking in the sides of the doors and every where. One of our weekly journals had an article this morning on the damage they have caused many of Virginia's crop these past few years. One winery lost their whole years output due to the bugs being in the wine. They had to dump a whole years crop.
Amazing!!!!!!!!!
Ruby
Bump
Starting to see them again this fall 2013. Any news or success stories out there?
I saw one on a screen and immediately thought of dear Ruby!!
I saw a couple with the few cold days about 2 weeks ago, got my peppermint and cotton balls out to make sure the space on my slider was closed off to them...def seems to keep them out
Also, my quarterly visit from my pest control guy keeps them out....I maybe get 1 inside if they fly in while the door is open but that's it
I saw one on my Dr. Seuss brug bloom...that is it, so far.
Last winter--I may have come across 6 of them all winter--mostly in the
sashes of my windows. They just fell out when i was taking my windows apart
(yes--i have the old ones) and they were in there---somewhere...
Never checked my attic--don't want to......
G.
Some things are best left unseen!
Hahahaha......I knew you folks would remember my claim to fame......lady with the most stink bugs ever.....I went along very happily all summer and probably saw as many as Gita counted last winter.....that is until this week!!! I counted three different days this week how many I gathered and put in my soapy bottle of water.......one day about fifty or so, one day about sixty or so, and the warmest day this week I counted over one hundred of the suckers that I captured.....it was a cooler day yesterday and saw less than ten of them......Weird thing is, that they must really love this mountain air something because even though others in town have to deal with them, they are not dealing with a hundred or so a day like I am......
Anyway......I feel fortunate that they haven't been an all summer long pest at least....I can deal with a short period of messing with them but not too very long. I did notice some weeks back when they first started appearing that they were either baby ones, or another theory of their mutated appearance, might have been from the poisonous spray that I have spent hundreds of dollars on the past couple of years.....anyway....they were dark black and about half the size of the ones I had encountered in the past.......I have even see a couple that are chartreuse in color too....so very odd this time.
Jen, please count yourself very lucky........thankfully for the most part they are staying outdoors here too other than a very few that get in the back entry but are usually found within a foot or two of that door......two years ago they had infested the house and I had to hire a woman to come and remove things from the walls, wash the walls down and we are talking in the hundreds then too......they get behind picture frames and mirrors and just about every place there is a slit for them to sneak through....
One of our members Sally happened to visit my home during last years invasion and I put her to work getting the bugs which were higher than I can reach.....I have a cheapie butterfly net that I catch them in and then transfer to a soapy bottles of water which drowns them.....remember, they do not freeze, but have a built in anti-freeze protectant.....drowning or burning is the way to go.....as always.....an interesting topic for me.....thanks for thinking of me Jan.....hahaha
Ruby
Sooo glad you popped in, dear!!! Cuz I was thinking maybe they had carried you away!!!
eeeeeeee, yikes....I would have moved out till they were gone! LOL
I had one land in my coffee and not like the inside of my mouth. I hurried to the house and bit a piece of lemon, instant relief, even without the tequila!
We don't seem to have many this year, only enough to mess with the tomatoes and they already were having a bad year.
Hi! Ruby
Ric!!
You're kidding me, that is awful. I have also had the unfortunate experience of tasting one. Not a good start to your morning.
bleccchhh!!!
Friend of ours had 1 land on a piece of celery...he thought his wife put hot peppers on it....went and chugged some whiskey
ICK!
Ditto ICK RICK UGH..... I'm with Ruby on the volume of stink bug invasion. First year infestation was the worst, but still have a significant amount each year. I'm lucky I haven't mistakenly eaten one yet, knock on wood.... Eewwwwwww.
Yes, Ruby - glad to have you pop in. Missed you and John at the Fall Swap.
We don't seem to have many this year. I haven't even sprayed the window sills yet. Knock, knock, knock! Just enough to mess up a number of tomatoes.I've been using the Bengal Gold Roach spray since Ruby told me about it, and although expensive, I believe I'm still using the original can. It must work as a repellant or mess up their pheromones because they don't crowd the old points of entry anymore.
If you do get one in your mouth, remember vinegar takes it away, then sip a little EVOO, eat some lettuce, and chalk it up as a salad with protein. LOL
I had one on the door screen today and wondered...And so it begins...? They've been almost nonexistent in my garden.
Same for us Sally, We have seen very few this year but today I probably sucked up 2 or 3 doz. They were all over the screen door. Ric went out and found that Roach Spray he bought that works very good on stink bugs. I sprayed the edges of the door and screen and that was the end of them, at least for today.
New article on Stink Bugs
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/28/garden/wanted-dead-or-alive-no-just-dead.html?_r=1&
Great link Susan, thanks! I have seen very few BMSB this year.
I think I saw one---a dead one. That's it.
Even outside in the fall--I saw only two--on my Roses.
I'm lucky--I guess......G.
As Holly said we had some, but nothing like previous years. I did notice more mantises this year, also I don't think this year they smell as bad as previously, to the point I just squish them, many times with no noticeable odor.
Just thought I'd mention the laugh I got on another thread when SallyG wished a Merry Christmas to "everyone except the stink bug crawling up my sweater sleeve."
I've noted the same here, fewer stink bugs, more predators, although we've always had good numbers of mantids, spiders, wheelbugs, and more kinds of wasp-ish critters than I'd want to try to ID!.
Stinkin stink bugs. I continue to have just enough to be annoying. I have to say it is much better than the infestation of a few years ago though. I had one drop on my dinner plate last night. Gross.....
We're still finding 1-2 a day, especially those warmer days we had. They were going to the back door, and I was happy to let them out.LOL
More great news on stinkbugs. This time it's because of the polar vortex. http://www.rodalenews.com/stink-bug-rates
Great! It may hold true for other garden pests I think.