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Showing posts from June, 2011

Indoor Spider Control/Spider Traps

"Wandering-Type" Spiders   brown recluse spider Most spiders spin a web and stay close to the web for much of their lives. A few don't spin webs or don't stay close to the ones they do spin. These spiders are more active hunters and tend to "wander" into homes more often than the less active type. The term "wandering spider" is not a taxonomic classification but rather refers to this more active, hunting behavior. Two wandering-type spiders in particular, the brown recluse spider and the hobo spider , are noteworthy because they may also be venomous. Sticky Spider Traps Sticky spider traps are generally considered to be the best way to reduce the number of wandering-type spiders in homes. Not only are traps effective but since they contain no pesticides they are very safe to use. Sticky traps are very simple, consisting of a cardboard tube that is partly coated inside with a sticky material. The spiders wander into the tube at

Yellowjacket Wasp Control In Vineyards With Poison Baits

aerial wasp nest Yellowjacket wasps (social wasps in the family Vespidae) are significant pests in grape vineyards both in terms of the direct damage they do to fruit and also the impact their aggressive, territorial behavior has on vineyard worker productivity and safety. Fruit Damage Most wasp species forage for live prey, mostly other insects, as well as carrion and plant sap. Maturing grapes are a source of plant sap and wasps will tear the outer skin to get at the grape juice inside causing yield and quality losses . Since wasp nests reach their maximum size about the time grapes mature, this damage can be significant in some varieties, in some years. Worker Productivity and Safety The social wasps build large communal colonies (nests) consisting of hundreds to thousands of individual wasps each capable of delivering a painful sting to an intruder. These colonies are built both above ground (aerial nests), and below ground in abandoned rodent burrows or other cavities

Wood Treatment With Bora Care or TimBor

Boric acid, or borate salt, is an excellent wood preservative , fungicide (kills rot fungi) and insecticide . It is very low toxicity, has low environmental impact and is relatively cheap. It is an ideal material for treating both hardwood and softwood against attack by fungi ( dry rot fungi ), and insects. The only real downside is that borate compounds are generally water soluble so must be used in dry environments or protected with a finish of some kind that seals them in the wood. Borates are available as dry powders ( TimBor and others) or as glycol-based liquid concentrates ( Bora Care and others). Glycol is intended to improve the penetration of borate into wood fibers but studies have not definitively demonstrated an advantage over simple water solutions. Glycol-based products are also somewhat more expensive than powder forms. Both TimBor and Bora Care should be applied to dry, unfinished wood surfaces with a pump sprayer or paint roller. Two coats are sometimes needed

Small, Brown, Hardshell Bugs!

Have you ever found small, brown, slow-moving bugs crawling around your house that appear to have a hard-shell ? If you look closely the hard cover appears to be split down the back. These are beetles, probably one of several "stored product" beetles that infest dry foods and natural fabrics. If the beetles appear black, or mottled with red/gray/black, instead of brown they are probably one of the dermestid (Dermestidae) carpet beetles but the brown ones are likely one of the anobiid (Anobiidae) beetles, for example the cigarette or drugstore beetles . If the brown/black beetle has a tan stripe across the back it is probably the larder beetle , another one of the dermestid beetles. This very large and diverse group of beetles are specialist scavengers on dead plant and animal products. They evolved as nature's master "recyclers" that help breakdown and decompose dead plant and animal tissue. If you think about it from the beetle's point