Box Elder bugs

[richhodg66]

We seem to have a lot of these get in the house in winter some years but this year has been the worst by far. They seem to be harmless, just don't like having crawly things all over.

One decided to go swimming in my coffee cup this morning when I set it down and that was a nasty suprise when I took a sip. Anybody know what you can do about them? I've heard a spray bottle of soapywater solution killds them pretty well.

The good news is, they usually dissappear when it warms up, there just seem to be a lot more of them this year.

[mongoosesnipe]

step one get rid of the box elder trees around your house then soapy water works pretty well i like ivory dish soap cause it is just soap and does not mess anything up

[Reload3006]

^^^^ what he said your never going to be rid of elder bugs as long as you have Box elder trees around.

[richhodg66]

We have two big maple trees in the front yard and two in the backyard. This house had a bunch of big trees, still does, but I have had a few cut out over the years.

I really doubt getting rid of those maples will happen. We don't have these bugs like this every year, in fact, we've had a lot of years where we didn't have any really. I wonder what makes some years different?

Gonna go buy a bunch of spray bottles and clear dish detergent today and start putting bottles in each room. Our church hs a big glass door in the foyer facing south and has been having a lot of them this year too, but I can only think of one maple in that yard.

[imashooter2]

For a few years, we had huge infestations around here. Swarms would cover the sides of houses and garages. Soapy water does very well and we made a serious campaign out of it to get things under control. Get rid of the leaf litter that they like to winter / breed in as well.

ETA, we used one of those pump up garden sprayers. Small squirt bottles just won't cut it for large areas.

[DCP]

Just use the shop vac on them.

[Plate plinker]

All good sound advice. The box tree can be rather far off too. So you may not even know of its location. Personally as long as they are outside the house I don't care they just remind me of the fall time of year and the outdoors. Same goes for the smell of a skunk and corn silage.

[runfiverun]

we have had an occasional one here and there this year also.
we had a couple of day's in late summer where the front of the house got a bunch of them on it.
they will just pop up from nowhere it seems.
they must come from the chinese elms in the neighbors yard.

[DLCTEX]

Ortho Home Defense spray works for me on all manner of bugs. I don't guess we have box elder bugs, but we have elm beetles that seem to be about the same kind of nuisance. I have used it outside for an invasion of chinch bugs that were all over the walls of the house and buildings. One tip is to shake it up well before spraying as it seems to separate when setting.

[429421Cowboy]

Yep, you can spray down the sides of your house with dish soap to slow them down, but nothing will get rid of them. They seem to be attracted most to light colored walls, especially when they are small. They don't hurt anything, just the idea of having flying, crawling, bright orange bugs everywhere gets old after awhile.

We live in a river bottom, surrounded by thousands of box elder trees so they are just a fact of life, i have seen them many many miles from where you would expect a tree to be, they sure can move!

[uscra112]

I had them when I lived in Michigan. They swarm into crevices in your siding as winter approaches. Some of them find their way through in into your house. Worst if you have an old house. I used to patrol with a shop-vac at swarming time, and that cut the spring infestations down by quite a bit.

[Charley]

You can vacuum them up, when they hit the back of the bag at high speed, arthropods tend to shatter. They won't crawl out of the bag... Boxelders tend to be cyclic from year to year, populations tend to increase and decline in population over about a five to seven year cycle, at least around here. They are true bugs, bugidadae, and don't really affect we humans. They can bite, and they have piercing/sucking mouthparts (sounds kinda pornographic!). Bite can cause irritation, but doesn't happen very often. Only real problem with them is the numbers when at the cycle's peak, they seem to be everywhere, and can be a bit of a PITA.
Control can be mechanical (the vacuum mentioned), detergent and water will kill on contact (detergent lowers the surface tension of the water, it enters the insect's breathing spiracles and they drown), or you can use a contact/residual insecticide. The Ortho product mentioned contains Bifenthrin as the active ingredient, it is a synthetic pyrethroid and is pretty safe for non target animals. It will continue to affect the insect population for several days, depending on the environment around the treated area.

[tomme boy]

Go get a couple of cats. The bugs don't last long around here with my 3 bug assassins.

[richhodg66]

We had them swarming on the south and west side of the house last late summer, I hit them a couple of times a day with a sprayer of insecticide, I just don't like poisons around. I worked for Orkin for several months before I went in the Army and really had to wonder a lot about the effects of that stuff being sprayed around.

I like the dishwater idea, gonna try that outside this next year and see if I can't prevent them from being so bad next winter.

[MT Gianni]

If the tree is on your property a tree man can inject the tree when the sap is rising and poison the seeds so that they don't develop. In 2000 ours charged $40 for a 55 foot tree. There are female and male trees, you need only poison the seed bearers. The bugs can only set box elder seeds and will die without them. Step two is to spray a mix of chewing tobacco in a gallon of water. Use about 1/4 pouch per gallon. The Nicotine poisons them as they crawl across it. It lasts 2-3 times as long as soapy water but is only effective when you are not watering the lawn.

[DHurtig]

I always remember my mom calling them " those damned little democrats". Dale

[Epd230]

Gonna have to cruise the neighborhood and look for that box elder tree. I have these all over my house and not a tree in sight. Havn't tried the soap yet, but will do this spring

[Charley]

We had them swarming on the south and west side of the house last late summer, I hit them a couple of times a day with a sprayer of insecticide, I just don't like poisons around. I worked for Orkin for several months before I went in the Army and really had to wonder a lot about the effects of that stuff being sprayed around.

I like the dishwater idea, gonna try that outside this next year and see if I can't prevent them from being so bad next winter.

Considered if I should repost about this...I'm an entomologist, and have been attached to the pest management industry for over 30 years. In my experience, the big national guys, like Orkin and Terminex are short on training and long on taking advantage of the public's ignorance of pestcides and pest issues.
The nicotine will work as well, but tough to get a repeatable concentration with different tobaccos. My guys use a fair amount of a synthetic copy of nicotine. Vey low mammalian toxicity...Canine Advantage is the same active (imidacloprid and cyfluthrin), and is applied directly to your dog at about a 6% concentration. Highest legal application for pest management is .15%.
Most people's understanding of pesticide toxicity is close to the general public's ideas about casting with lead...smoking tobacco is far more dangerous to your health than either current pesticides OR using lead.

[imashooter2]

Considered if I should repost about this...I'm an entomologist, and have been attached to the pest management industry for over 30 years. In my experience, the big national guys, like Orkin and Terminex are short on training and long on taking advantage of the public's ignorance of pestcides and pest issues.
The nicotine will work as well, but tough to get a repeatable concentration with different tobaccos. My guys use a fair amount of a synthetic copy of nicotine. Vey low mammalian toxicity...Canine Advantage is the same active (imidacloprid and cyfluthrin), and is applied directly to your dog at about a 6% concentration. Highest legal application for pest management is .15%.
Most people's understanding of pesticide toxicity is close to the general public's ideas about casting with lead...smoking tobacco is far more dangerous to your health than either current pesticides OR using lead.

Thanks for posting. :) What's your professional opinion of soapy water? It seems to be working well for us. Just wondering if that was real results or an illusion because the bugs just went somewhere else...

[richhodg66]

Considered if I should repost about this...I'm an entomologist, and have been attached to the pest management industry for over 30 years. In my experience, the big national guys, like Orkin and Terminex are short on training and long on taking advantage of the public's ignorance of pestcides and pest issues.
The nicotine will work as well, but tough to get a repeatable concentration with different tobaccos. My guys use a fair amount of a synthetic copy of nicotine. Vey low mammalian toxicity...Canine Advantage is the same active (imidacloprid and cyfluthrin), and is applied directly to your dog at about a 6% concentration. Highest legal application for pest management is .15%.
Most people's understanding of pesticide toxicity is close to the general public's ideas about casting with lead...smoking tobacco is far more dangerous to your health than either current pesticides OR using lead.

I agree completely. That job absolutely sucked for a lot of reasons and I'd never work for them again. I needed a job between school and my entry into the Army. Lasted about three months.

The dishwater solution kills them real fast, I was suprised. The spray bottle Menards had were a little large and spray more forcefully than I like inside the house, but it sure kills 'em.

[Charley]

Thanks for posting. :) What's your professional opinion of soapy water? It seems to be working well for us. Just wondering if that was real results or an illusion because the bugs just went somewhere else...
No, the detergent/water combo will kill most insects and arachnids (spiders/scorpions). The detergent lowers the surface tension of the water (makes it "wetter") and it enters the insects breathing holes along its abdomen, and the insects drown. The upside? it is cheap, safe, and effective. The downside? There is no residual effect, it doesn't stop other insects later.

[Ed Barrett]

Just start the rumor that they make a great additive for bullet lube and all the casters will be picking them up by the bushel basket.

On a more serious note around here they put Osage oranges, some people call them Hedge apples, in crawl spaces and around the foundation. They old timers around here swear by them. I've done it around the house and sheds and seems to work for me. Gather them in the fall after they fall to the ground but before they dry. The only problem is Osage orange doesn't grow all over.

[richhodg66]

I've heard that about Osage, and there's no shortage of them here, that's for sure. I thought about chopping some up and spreading the chips around, I like the idea of a natural repellent.

[rhadamanthos12]

Order some CY KICK, it is what the exterminators use (At least in this area). Just spray it around the entry ways and base boards and it should keep everything out of your place. A lot of my coworkers use this, seems like living in NM everyone gets insects in their place, using the CY KICK has drastically reduced the amount of insects that make it into the house and live.

Here is a link for it on amazon, I have no idea of another place you can get it.

http://www.amazon.com/Cy-Kick-Controlled-Release-Cyfluthrin-Insecticide/dp/B002ACMKV8/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1363180917&sr=8-1&keywords=CY+KICK

[Charley]

Cy Kick isn't a bad product, but technology has passed it up, IMO. It is inexpensive, and much better than the OTC products you see at the big box stores. If you do buy it, read and follow the label. It costs about $80,000,000 to bring a pesticide to market, the manufacturer has a pretty good idea how to use it. At least, a better idea than the bubba who tells you to "just squirt it everwhere".

[KCSO]

My wife planted , I think, geraniums around the house and that kept the booxelder bugs away. Before that they would cover the south side of the house every afternoon. Have no bug knoowledge but she read it somewhere and it worked. Now if we could just get rid of the ants.