To my knowledge there’s no stagnant water on my property, I’ve run water through all my ptraps, and I’m careful to not leave doors open. Yet at any given time there’s at least 3 in my house. I can’t sleep, i can’t sit on the couch, i can’t exist in the fear of being sucked dry.
The breaking point is when i watched my dog get bit on her head. I’m ready to do whatever it takes and then some. I will kill a man if it saves me from these demons. Any ideas?
Look up how to make a carbon dioxide trap for mosquitoes. They are strongly attracted to CO2.
Ah that’s right! It is CO2. My mind remembered it as propane for some reason.
Please don’t make a propane trap
In the business we just call that a “bomb” (hard B)
which B is hard?
The middle one
It’s a clean burning fuel I tell you hwat
The propaganda from King of the Hill has made for sub-prime cookouts for all my life up until a few months ago.
Believing propane was the superior heating element of the cookout, because of Hank Hill, I never tried a charcoal grill. But when I went to other folks cookouts, it tasted so good. A little sweet and smokiness charred into the meat, “How did they do that?!” I contemplated late into many nights.
I switched to Charcoal after a friendly suggestion, and the difference is mind-blowing. If you’re cooking with propane, you might as well be cooking on a stove.
To be fair, there was an episode of KotH where Bobby and Peggy discover that charcoal was actually superior to propane when it came to taste. It was a whole big thing and hilarious to watch them try to keep it a secret from Hank lol
My memory was hazy. It’s actually a CO2 trap. Propane trap would be no bueno! 😹
No wonder your momories are hazy, you inhale too much propane.
would be malo*
Muy malo, one might say.
If fire got close to it, it would be muy malo ayayay
To be fair it would probably kill some mosquitoes
Or if you do, make sure to film it.
There are traps which are called mosquito magnets and they hook up to a propane tank to burn a small pilot light which produces CO2 to attract mosquitos and pull them into a bag via a fan.
You want to place them at the edge of your property though not close to your deck because they attract mosquitos in order to kill them.
I have tried these. They are expensive to run as you need to burn through a tank of propane each month. They do catch some mosquitoes, but they make little overall difference.
Still looking for a working solution.
Okay then go with the electric ones. I had the propane trap and while it worked well the constant propane tank refill was a drag and I certainly couldn’t afford multiple.
Enter Dynatrap + Mods.
Dynatrap uses an electric light and fan. It works medium but if you put the octenol attractant in the catch basket it really turbocharged it. Want to kill more? Hang a “bug ball” under the trap covered with Tanglefoot spray. Any mosquito that lands on the ball dies there because they are stuck. The ball will be thoroughly disgusting looking quickly but very effective.
I’ve spent many years combating.
The Bt mosquito dunks help for any standing water ( have gutters?)
Encourage swallows, bats, frogs too.
Good luck!
Thanks! I have a dynatrap, I’m going to try this mod!
Because there’s a unit you can buy that burns propane to make CO2 and pull mosquittos away from you to a different area of the yard.
Watch out! Generating CO2 in enclosed spaces might turn into a health hazard without monitoring it.
CO2 is also “heavy” and tends to sink, so watch out for pets as it could be deadly for them - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cave_of_Dogs
If you get creative you can put maybe a candle floating in the middle of a large bowl of water, then a bit of detergent will break the surface tension to make them fall in. The detergent will also kill them.
This. I knew an engineer once who built a long electrified copper pipe that would leak CO2. He would drink beer on his back porch and watch them die.
I found some simple traps which look promising to me here:
https://www.bobvila.com/articles/diy-mosquito-trap/
The first one is co2 based, using yeast.
I kinda like the idea of the last one, especially for indoors in the summer. It seems very simple and makes a lot of sense to me: secure some window screen mesh to the output side of a box fan. Let the fan run. The mosquitos get sucked in and trapped against the mesh until they dry out and die. Spray them with a mixture of rubbing alcohol and water if you want to speed up their demise.
Waw
I am allied with spiders against mosquitoes and bedbugs. I don’t take down their webs (unless they’re in the way) and they eat hundreds of the fuckers. They’re also fun to watch sometimes.
I wish we could talk to spiders. I’d write an agreement with one that says, as long as it doesn’t crawl on me, it can live in the house. I’ll even build it a little shelf to protect from fan wind.
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Huntsman don’t make webs tho, are huge and repulsive, run very fast and tend to let themselves fall off the wall. I’ve moderate to intense arachnophobia, and I’ve one fall on my bed one night. Not pleasant at all.
I would like to invasive species your huntsman we moved here and they have roaches in all the garages in the neighborhood (the place used to be an orchard, and before that like all of the americas an indian burial ground)
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I would also include a clause that says I never have to see it ever. It can basically be a roommate that lives in the basement and has their own entrance in the garage.
We can’t write those agreements, but evolution could do it for us. I know that we kill an insignificant amount of them compared to how many are in the wild, but maybe certain spiders in urban areas could be under enough evolutionary strain to actually get better at staying out of our way.
Not sure if this is good or bad news for our great (10^6) grandchildren. On the one hand, maybe they’ll see less spiders. On the other hand, urban-camo spiders sounds horrifying.
I woke up the other night gagging in my sleep. I swallowed spastically, compulsively over and over - something was in there. I coughed and wheezed and choked for what felt like hours before it was gone. But a lump lingered until I finally fell asleep again. I chose to believe it was a common house fly, but it went down large and hard.
The moral is, its not about seeing the spiders, its about having stupid, instinct-only vermin that will crawl into any dark, moist space it finds. Their instinct doesn’t even allow for a concept of what a human is. They only know how to eat and screw and maybe be afraid.
I can count on one hand the amount of times I’ve had spiders crawl on me even while living with them, and yeah it still makes me squirm. They usually mind their own business.
Yeah same. My issue is I’m irrationally afraid of the possibility.
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We had a “pet” spider that lived in the kitchen. There was this spot the ants kept getting in, and he (? I assume) moved there and just started eating the ants. I hate ants. And so a pact was formed. Then one year my mom hired a cleaning lady and she didn’t bother to ask about Gerald.
Poor Gerald :(
I wish my wife didn’t have some gnarly arachnophobia. The “spiders are beneficial” argument doesn’t work :(
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I have been doing this to myself for over a year, and nowadays I think tarantulas are cute, and I’m looking forward to learning to tolerate harvestmen.
Harvestmen are fine tho, they have nearly invisible legs, and legs are what repulsme me so hard.
Fuck huntsman spiders.
She might be able to overcome it with education and exposure.
What the spiders don’t know is that I’m also allied with the house centipedes. And neither of them know about my treaty with the cats.
I have so many spiders on my property. My fave is the bold jumper that lives in my living room. He started off by moving in and residing in a box of captain crunch. I let him live there and he left eventually and moved to the living room. Idk what he ate when he lived the cereal box, but he got significantly bigger.
I only remove brown recluse spiders, most other types of household spiders can be trusted.
Yeah, identify any actually dangerous spiders in your area and don’t keep them, most are harmless though.
- Fly screens (Unrealistic solution but I wanted to mention it)
- Get a Pet Frog that eats them
- Get lots of Spiders making Webs. Be aware that the Pet frog might eat the spiders
- Flood one of your rooms and make a little swamp where you can plant canivourus plants. The issue is that the swamp will breed more mosquito than it kills but the frog will feel right at home
- Make a small campfire in your bedroom before you go to sleep. It is known that smoke scares them away. Make sure to keep the windows and door closed so no new mosquito get inside. This is probably the most effective as you won’t get stung for the rest of you life
- Catch some mosquitos and suck the blood out of them. The other mosquitos will see their wrongdoings and change their ways
Campfire solution worked for m-
Fly screens (Unrealistic solution but I wanted to mention it)
Can I ask why you consider that an unrealistic solution? In my experience the plant based products are ineffective but I haven’t tried fly screens yet.
It more of a joke because its the only real solution in my list. They are limited to your house but from my experience there’s no way normal mosquitos can go through them. I think mosquitos don’t really give a fuck about smells (at least not enough) and the problem is that they dont spread that well.
Get a couple of buckets of water and place them around your yard. Drop a “Misquote Dunks” tablet in each bucket. Follow the package instructions for refreshing the dunks every so often.
Mosquito dunks work by “poisoning” what looks to the mosquito like an ideal spot to lay eggs; a pale of still water. But the mosquito dunk bacteria kills the mosquito larvae before they hatch.
It’s a more “long term” solution as it doesn’t actively take care of the current mosquito population but it prevents them from breeding.
There is also a type of fish called the misquitofish that you can put in a small pond, such as a wash basin or feeding trough. They feed on the mosquito larvae and are fairly self sufficient. I know people who use them to control mosquito populations in their gardens and they rarely have to do any kind of maintenance.
When I did Facilities stuff they’d have me go around and dunk all the storm drains too
It also doesnt kill mosquitos that lay eggs elsewhere
1.mosquito net for doors and windows - ultimate solution
2.mosquito badminton. - great for few of them, you can just zap them with it.
agree on the nets for doors and windows. For doors there’s also some nets with magnets that can be crossed though and they will self-close perfectly every single time thanks to the magnets.
Badminton is great too, including against flies, wasps and whatever manages to get in.
We had one of the magnet screen door dealios and it worked really well. Until the cat discovered he could just go out on the porch to try and escape.
well you can get permanent door made with steel wire mesh.
I’ve seen those electric racket looking things and always wondered how well they work. I’ll definitely be picking some up now.
they work great for upto a year, after that all of them broke down.
it depends in my experience. Mine has lasted for years, but I had to stretch the net a bit to avoid contact with the middle one after a bad hit. In my experience, if one don’t think one’s at Wimbledon, they should last.
they work great, but you have to chase the insects. It’s even better if you have chickens because you can feed them with the victims, as no poison is involved in the killing.
mosquito Badminton is so funny.
I don’t know what to call them and badminton is famous here so we call them that.
Yea after wasting a lot of money on repelents and creams , I realised just closing doors after 5 pm and netting the windows was the best solution. I also use net tent for my bed.
Check your gutters to make sure they’re clear and there’s no standing water in them. It’s easy to miss it up there.
Great. New fear unlocked
Nuclear weapons might work
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Preferably from orbit.
If you are inside, set up an oscillating fan. They can’t fly well in windy conditions.
Was watching a video where one place they rest is under the leaves of plants. Yiu can buy mosquitoe killer spray, but be sure to get underneath the leaves.
As others have mentioned, standing water is bad. They can survive and thus breed in a LOT smaller volume of water than people realize.
This is real.
We setup a largish fan outside near our fire pit, attached to an inverter powered by a power tool battery.
It dramatically reduced the mosquitos. A few will still make but for the most past it solved the issue.
I do this when doing yard work. Can feel great to have a little cool down, and really keeps them off me when doing anything stationary. Hell, I’ve even rigged up a little one that clamps on to my lawn tractor to blow at me while driving.
A breeze is nice, but no mosquitoes is fuckin’ gold!
The smoke from the fire pit also helps in keeping them away.
One can also plant lavender and catnip and some other plants which mosquitos don’t like.
It’s smokeless. We had lots of mosquito-filled nights before the fan made its appearance.
Even roadside water catch basins in front of your home can produce 100-1000 mosquitos a week if you live in a warm area.
Permethrin treated clothes will kill just about anything that bites you through your clothes, including horse flies. Then you could wear a very thin layer of clothes and be fine. Their death happens before they even get through the fibers.
You can buy pretreated or get the solution to make your own. I think its using the same chemical that chrysanthemums produce to fight bug eating them.
I would be cautious about that if you have a cat, and/or children. It’s toxic to cats and some people are hypersensitive to it.
Call an exterminator, preferably a small mom&pop shop and not a big Orkin or Terminex or whatever, and have them come and and do a mosquito treatment. They’ll spray a chemical on the outside of your house, under the leaves of your trees/bushes, etc. Then they’ll spray inside, but just the corners for other bugs. You’ll need to keep your dog out of the chemical inside for about 10-20 minutes, and out of the chemical outside for probably an hour. After that it’s dry and non-toxic to mammals but will get soaked up by insects. Be sure to double check that with the exterminator, times vary depending on the chemical used.
Good treatments should last a solid 2-3 months, which ought to be enough to get you through the worst of mosquito season, unless you’re in Florida or something.
I’ve heard that those treatments are fairly indiscriminate and will kill most insects, not just mosquitoes. I worry about the effect on the local ecosystem such as birds that would eat them.
You’re not wrong, it’s kind of like nuking from orbit. But there are definitely things you can do to help, like only spraying the house and immediately surrounding areas. Focus on spraying thick, decorative shrubs and not flowers where bees are likely to congregate. Spray at times bees aren’t out looking for food and mosquitoes are most likely hiding in shrubs during the heat of the day.
There are lots of other great suggestions in this thread, and I’d recommend the bait and zappers if OP only had the occasional mosquito in the house, or DEET if OP is temporarily outside, but bait doesn’t work on a large scale and deet is really bad for synthetic clothing/fabrics and wearing it all day in the house is a terrible idea.
The biggest thing everyone can do is clear out any standing water (buckets, tools, etc… mosquitoes will even lay eggs in a teaspoon of water given a chance), but op has already done that.
That makes sense, I appreciate the extra info!
Imo the easiest option: fly screens everywhere. Especially in bedroom and keep this door closed so they won’t get in (in case they come through other doors)
I no longer have issues with them and if I ever see one, I just use my electric fly swatter. I also can’t sleep when there’s one in the room.
Fly screens are totally worth it. Self made might be cheaper, but I’m not cerrain since I didn’t do them myself.
Only real solution is anti musquito net on windows, unless you are willing to move to island or antarctic
Get a bug zapper with a UV bulb, even if its branded for outdoor use it’ll work fine inside.
I left my bedroom window open a few times in the summer and came back to a bedroom full of lacewings.
Put up a bug zapper, turned the lights off, and it was no longer a problem a couple hours later. Just had to vacuum up the dead bugs on the floor.
Mosquitoes aren’t attracted to light. You’re only killing moths and other insects with that, maybe some mosquito but not all.
Things that actually attracts mosquitoes:
-Standing Water.
-Carbon Dioxide.
-Strong Fragrances.
-Overgrown Vegetation.
Maybe it depends on the kind, because when we let mosquitos in and use the bug zapper, we dont get bit. It would have to be quite the luck if it was not attracting them one way or another. It certainly works on almost everything that flies and harasses you at night. It sounds like a controlled experiment is in order.
I made this simulation to show how effective attraction to a bug light can be an emergent property of a mosquito’s navigation and confinement, even though they are not attracted to light innately.
See my mastodon post.
Thanks for sending me in this direction, its been fun!
