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I enjoyed your well informed and well planned article. Thanks!
We are going into our 4th summer on this continent and are facing another round in the battle with the bugs!
Having moved here from southern Africa, we were horrified to see so many mosquitoes which mean a good chance to catch Malaria where we came from! If Africa had as many mozzies it would probably be unpopulated!
Living near swampy Cedar forest, our garden is inundated with mozzies , mainly at dusk and dawn but at times all day long. Being a dedicated gardener I have learned to do my important jobs for the season before mid-June as it gets plainly impossible lateron. So while my garden it looking its most lovely, I have to be content with quick forreys to the veg garden and hurried visits to my flower beds - covered in 40% DEET.
This year I started researching Co2 traps, and the idea does sound very good. In order to test the theory I made a rudimentary Co2 'dispenser' in the form of a 2l cool drink bottle with some sugar water and yeast. On the first evening , which happened to be a full-moon night too it was surrounded in a cloud of bugs! But how to kill them once they are there? The bubbling brew seems to have lost its attraction by now, by the way.
We love being out of doors, so is it a worth while investment? These units cost up to $500 after all.
binibusybee,
Hello, and thanks for reading the article. I know the "Dunks" does kill the larvae in water, as I've had to resort to that already this year in my own yard. We have just recently discovered the local source of our skeeter problems (and it wasn't my doing this time, lol) and really need to have something done, too.
I have no experience with the C02 traps either, but like you, I'm very tempted by them. Thanks for sharing the results of your own experiments. You may have a good idea there if, as you say, we could find something to kill the adults before they can bite us.
I would be very interested in hearing any experiences others may have had with the C02 traps myself!
Thanks for your comments and have a happy summer growing season,
Bev
We have invested in a Mosquito trap this summer. We live in Arlington (the Interlochen area, if you know Arlington) and have a "creek" on our property - a creek which the county has apparently dammed up so that it only flows when it rains. Otherwise, it is a mosquito pit.
We were getting eaten alive.
The population seems to have gone down in about 9 days. That is, I can go out there and not be covered by black mosquitoes in the first 5 minutes. I have still been bitten, but the amount of those nasty things seems to be lessening.
The upkeep/maintenance/supplies on this thing aren't cheap, either. You have to get "bait" (pheromones to draw the females, the only biters) and it is $16 per package of 2. A bait lasts (we're told) approximately 3 weeks, the same length that the Propane Tank you need to invest in and runs 24 hours/7days per week will last.
So, add it up: $16 for 2 baits, which will last 6 weeks. Then the $50 for the tank, and refilling it each 3 week period at a cost of about $18.
It's pricey. I am hopeful that it works, otherwise we're going to have to return it. It is truly a big investment.
Caroline, Thanks for letting us know about the cost to operate one of the mosquito traps. I had no idea they were that expensive. And I didn't know there was bait involved. What kills them after they arrive at the bait? Flames from the propane? That's a shame to have that kind of expense just to enjoy your yard.
Nope, they get drawn to the machine by the CO2 mixing with the pheromone bait (I guess it creates some warmth, similar to your body heat) and then get sucked in by a 'vacuum' principle into a net. They eventually dehydrate and die.
Hello Caroline
Thanks for your reply! I'm new to the blog writing scene so I only found your response by accident just now.
I am glad to hear that the trap has made a difference. And the literature says that the results take a little while as you are gradually eliminating the breeding population.
We have not yet plucked up the courage to shell out money to invest in one of these but this year our tolerance is severely tested. We've been having a lot of rain so the boggy areas in the cedar woods behind us are churning out a steady stream of freshly hatched hungry bugs.
A local newsletter "The Packet", ran an interesting article last week. It was about the use of Bti (Bacillus thuringiensis israelensis) , an organic bacteria which kills black fly and mosquito larvae.
A small town in southern Ontario lobbied to have a program implemented to treat all breeding sites and apparently had a 90% improvement in the bug situation.
The product is for sale in the USA under brand names like "Mosquito Dunks" and "Mosquito Bits".
I wonder if any of the readers have tried these out? The main problem as usual would be in trying to eradicate enough bugs to feel the effects.
OK - Here is the final chapter on the Mosquito Trap.
The population drop in the first 9 days may have been wishful thinking, for it never got any better. I was still trying to hang sheets on the clothesline with 4 of those nasty buggers crawling around my ankles and legs, looking for a good place to bite, all at one time.
Sadly, we returned it. I enumerated the cost of maintenance in an earlier post, and coupled with the lack of aggressive trapping of mosquitoes, we coulld not justify the ongoing expense of the unit.
