How to keep down the insect population?

[crazyhen]

I am a magnet too. We have a tiny fly here that you don't notice but it leaves a painful itchy spot of 3 days redness and if too many bites I run a fever. I looked it up. It is a type of blackfly. Believe me I too swell for mosquito bites, nat bites etc. I am diabetic and if my sugar is high it is worse. Do not wear any parfume, or use any scented soap. Any thing fragrant makes it worse. Yes I buy the Deet by the cans all summer. Sigh ! It is my favorite time to garden etc. But me and the bugs have it out. Oh! the carpenter bees do not bother you and are good polinators in the garden as are the ground bumble bees. Now the yellow jackets are a constant war here, as are the paper wasp and hornets. I feel for you Jean

 

[Jenski]

Here are a couple of links that went around this forum last summer for FLY TRAPS:

https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?pid=842770#p842770


Here are the original directions if you don't want to scroll down the other thread.
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JENSKI'S NON-STINKY FLY TRAP

- 2-liter bottle
- 1/3 c. sugar
- 1/4 c. vinegar
- water

Take a 2-liter bottle, cut off the top 1/3, and in the bottom section mix water filled to the bottom of the "ring" of nubs on the bottle with the sugar and vinegar. Invert the top and stuff it down into the bottom section, making a funnel that the flies go down into. (The spout of the bottle should be above the liquid, so the flies get trapped in the bottle and drown.)

It doesn't smell really nasty like the store-bought traps do, and it works really well! The vinegar keeps the honeybees from getting caught in the trap. Just don't leave where animals or people can knock them over.
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About half way down the page on this link is a pic of the bottle setup for the fly trap, although that particular trap is for wasps ~

http://www.thriftyfun.com/tf35188732.tip.html

 

[kees]

Hmm...I have one 2-liter bottle. I think I need to buy more things to drink!

Suzy

 

[itsazoo]

I have horses & goats and am contemplating getting the fly predators (actually just ordered their free trial). My chicks will be here in 2 weeks and soon they'll be freely roaming all over the pasture & barn area soooo won't they eat the fly predator larvae?

I desperately need to control the flies and I'm HOPING the 25 chickens I'm getting will help by eating some flies themselves, but I'm concerned that fly predators might just be an expensive chicken treat.

 

[kees]

Yup...I'm concerned about that too!

Suzy

 

[chickbliss7]

Re: yellowjackets--they always come around if we have meat at a picnic. They're crazy for meat. Do you give your chickens meat? Those yellowjacket traps work pretty well if you get them outside at the beginning of warm weather--put them AWAY from your run--they'll find it. I'm looking for fly solutions. I, too, thought chickens would eat them! They eat any spiders that come around, so maybe that's the problem.

 

[Brindlebtch]

I thought muscovy ducks would chow down on flies?

 

[astylishgirl]

I am trying fly predators this summer. I just got my first batch and they haven't hatched yet. My husband thinks I am NUTS!

I live in southeast texas and the mosquitoes are BAD... BAD... BAD

 

[firedove]

As someone else mentioned, paper wasps are your best defense against yellow jackets. They are natural enemies and the paper wasps will kill any yellow jacket nest that encroaches near their nests. I had a great big yellow jacket nest hanging in my barn one summer but it was hidden by bales of hay. My loft is always full of paper wasp nests too. When I carefully moved the hay away from the yellow jacket nest the largest group of paper wasps burrowed into the side of the yellow jacket nest and killed all of the occupants. On the other hand, two years ago we had a weird spring and much of the paper wasp population was killed off by a late frost. That year we had yellow jackets everywhere.

Paper wasps have an open bottomed nest and are dark brown. They are fairly docile and will usually only sting if you put your hand or foot down on one. I have a big nest that always forms in my top opening straw bin. I can still lift the bin top where it is attached, get my straw out and close the bin by grabbing the bar next to the nest and pulling it forward. The wasps watch me as I work but they don't leave the nest to attack. Just treat your wasps with respect and they will help you curb the yellow jacket population.

It sounds like the flies are not being generated on your property because you clean and use DE regularly. Your only defense against them is traps since you can't kill them at the source.

For mosquitos and other biting flies the thermacell works great, but only if you are going to be in one area for a while. It will do a 15' radius and each repellent pad lasts for 4 hours. The butane cartridge that runs it lasts 12 hours. The only drawback to the Thermacell is that it isn't cheap. Usually $20-$25 for the device itself and refills run from $10 to $20 depending upon the size of the refill pack. HOWEVER, if you want to sit out on a patio or deck for a while and be biting bug free it works better than anything I have seen. It does nothing for stinging insects though.

Also, where yellow jackets are concerned, they usually are attracted in by something specific, do you have berry bushes or fruit trees on your property or on neighboring properties? Those seem to be the biggest draw. Dumpsters will also draw them in pretty fast. If it's fruits they are attracted to the best thing to do is collect them just as they ripen so the yellow jackets don't have a chance to feed on them. If it's dumpsters there isn't much you can do since you can't really seal a dumpster. Eliminating their food source and cultivating paper wasps will do the most to control those nasty little buggers.

 

[chicken_china_mom]

I have a wonderful product that is environmentally safe and kills nearly every bug imaginable. Let me tell you first how we came across it...
In 2005 I got back in contact with an old friend from high school and she has 3 daughters. They live in a suburb of Chicago that isn't a good place anymore to raise kids and in their public schools they have a massive problem with head lice. Well, her youngest daughter and my younger daughter hit it off fabulously, and I was unaware that Rhonda, her daughter had a really bad case of head lice. Well, my Emily got lice and was nice enough to share them with my older daughter Katie. Before I knew it they were so terribly infested that I was making repeated trips to the doctor to get prescriptions for Nix, but no matter how many times I treated them, and no matter what I used, nothing worked. We'd get to where the girls were clean, or we thought they were, and then we'd have another outbreak. The last time around they spread them to me AND my mom, and neither of us had EVER had lice before in our lives. I was darn close to shaving my head bald, and the kids too! And then I came across an ad on Craigslist and I told my mom about it. It was for a product that was suppose to be completely natural and have a 100% effective kill rate on everything from fleas and ticks to flies. I went to actual wesite and read through it thoroughly and the second I saw that it said it killed lice, I picked up the phone and we ordered some! It's expensive but oh it works wonders! The moment it came in the mail I ripped open the box, grabbed a kid and sprayed her head. It killed the lice the moment it made contact with them, and I combed out nothing but dead bugs, and the eggs came out too. I treated everyone, I sprayed bedding, soaked combs and brushes, the works. We have not had a single case of lice since. I even sent a bottle to my friend's house and told her to treat all 3 of her girls since she can't afford to buy the stuff herself. Her kids have been lice free now for nearly 2 years. If she suspects a kid came home with bugs, she immediately treats them. I use the stuff to treat my dogs, my cats, my ferrets, EVERYTHING. I spray around my baseboards, my windows, inside my cupboards, inside the dog beds, everywhere and we have zero bug problems. When we moved down here to Indiana last year from the Chicago area I found out very quickly that there is a HUGE problem with fleas and roundworms. Well, I went out into my yard and I sprayed the grass and it killed all the fleas and roundworm larvae that were lurking. I sprayed my plants too because we also have a problem out here with those stupid green Japanese beetles. When I get my coop next week I intend to do a weekly treatment inside of it to keep away mites, chicken lice, fleas, and anything else that can make my birds miserable. If the mites get on your birds legs you can spray it directly on their legs and the mites will die. Then you just remove them easily. I also use it on my girls as a bug repellent. My older daughter Katie is terribly allergic to mosquitoes and when she gets bitten she gets huge welts that last for weeks, so around my house I make sure there is no stagnant water lurking, and if there is, I add bleach to kill the larvae. I found that the mosquitoes like to live in the bushes at the base of my steps, so I sprayed the bushes. Katie only received one bite all of last summer, and that was because she forgot to put some on one evening when she was playing in the yard. The website is www.xerobugs.com and I already warned you, it's expensive, but it is sooooooooooo worth it! We have flies REAL bad here too, but I don't get any in my house here because I spray constantly as a preventative. I too carry an epi pen as I am allergic to bees, hornets, wasps, etc, but this stuff stops them in midflight and drops them to the ground dead as a doorknob. And my neighbors across the street raise honey bees, so I am always on guard! The main ingredient is cedar oil. I love this stuff and I will NOT go without it ever again. They have a lot of different products and it works for all sorts of animals. They even have stuff to treat horses. I hope that helps you as you fight against bugs this Spring and Summer. And if you do get some, let me know how it works for you. Good luck!