I have been reading FH since issue 10. Occasionally articles describe homes that are located near rivers and marshes. Except for screened porches, there is little discussion of any construction details specifically intended to keep insects out of these houses.
I have 68 acres in southeast Idaho bisected by the Bear River where we will eventually build. The bottom land there is perfect for mosquitos; there are a lot of them in the summer.
I’m looking for methods to minimize intrusion (recognizing that we’ll never keep all of them out). Of course the first defence is distance. We’ll be building on a bluff some seventy feet above the river. But what additional steps can we take in the design and as we build?
Blue Skies
scott
Replies
I think a storm porch where you enter might keep some of the skeeters from flying in when the door is open. Put up bat houses. Spray the yard with insecticide. Build the house tight, which is the way it shold be anyway.
A vestibule entry system is the way to go (door, short hall, door). Similar/same as a storm porch. You can put proximity sensors or closet switches (spring-loaded switch that turns on the light when the closet door is open, aka: fridge switch) to turn on a fixed fan pointing towards the outer door to reduce the number of 'followers'. In the heavy skeeter season, we put in a citronella source, even if it's just Skin-so-soft in a small bottle and hang a couple of whole garlics near the door too..
Phill Giles
The Unionville Woodwright
Unionville, Ontario
blocks of dry ice. It attracts them........place a couple about 50ft or so from the "protected area"...and most will fly out and bathe in the mist....till it all melts away.
maybe not so good for building....but works great for picnics and such. Drop a block in each corner of the yard and enjoy the nite. Jeff.......Sometimes on the toll road of life.....a handful of change is good.......
Cold, yet emitting CO2. Probably messes with their skeeter heads. I like it!
Bat houses can help a LOT if they decide to move in. And those big bird houses for purple-breasted warblers (or some such) that are claimed to eat 100's of squitters each night, but I don't know anyone whose has success with those.
There are also propane powered mosquito attractors/destroyers that use the CO2 and some octanol to attract them and the updraft from the pilot light to trap and dessicate them. Some go for $250. Others for $1200.
Bugs are not where the breezes are. So consider the prevailing winds and put your high-use outdoor areas where the wind will keep them at bay.
Habitat = bushes and high grass. The larger a perimeter of lawn you have, the less buggy the house will be. Also the better defense against wildfires. It's tough, because you want to live in the woods. But there are trade-offs to consider.
you can trap out the entire population with Mosquito Magnet... this is the one the Carribbean resorts use..
http://mosquitomagnet.com/
Mike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
Nothing to do with mosquitos, but I did happen to read an interesting article on deterring deer flies today:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2002/08/020815072703.htm
On my place, mosquitos are a bit of a nuisance until things dry out, however I will probably want to control them a bit more when the (supposedly inevitable) West Nile virus hits in a year or two...
Invest in a good genetics company to breed crocodile bats.
:>)
All this talk of building things to keep 'em out rather than working with the enviroment to take 'em out.
Take the time out now to build the homes for all the predators that will become your best friends of the summer.
For me, it's barn swallows and bluebirds during the day, and bats at nite.
7 years ago, I built and put up a dozen bat houses on the shop, on trees, (southfacing) and out of the 20 bluebird houses I've built and put up, 2 are bonified, bluebird residences. The rest were invaded by sparrows, wrens, and in one, a chipmonk!
The barn swallows need a three sided, roofed shelter and a source of fresh water. I love watching my little F-15 working the field.
You can come on out to my place and you will NOT ever get a sketter bite................Wander off into the tall grass and the timber though and you will walk out with chiggers (what purpose do these pests serve?) and ticks.
But don't forgo the other excellent building advice posted earlier.
You need to get some guinea fowl for the ticks and chiggers. They love them. And they are interesting birds, but probably not good if you have close neighbors. They're noisy and roam all over.
Purple MARTINS...not purple warblers, and they tend to be fussy about the location of their condos(did you hear about the Saudi Arabian prince who wanted to purchase some Purple Martins?). They need a nice open area to swoop in/out of the house, a field/meadow is good. If you do put up a house, make certain it's on a pole that can be raised and lowered easily(to knock out the nests of house/English sparrows and starlings before the scouts arrive in early spring). Don't remember how high up they like to be, but google on Purple Martin and you'll find all the info you need.
You will need lightning bugs and toads for slugs(if you are cursed w/slugs in your area) and frogs are also good insect eaters. House wrens are voracious and Red and Whitebreasted nuthatches hunt for bugs in tree bark. There's more, of course, but I'll let you digest this info for now.Meddle not in the affairs of dragons, for you are crunchy and taste good w/ketchup.
There was a piece on NPR (ATC or ME) a while back that was about new technology for gettin' skeeters. I think this is the link
http://search.npr.org/cf/cmn/segment_display.cfm?segID=144304
If it doesn't work, go to http://www.npr.org and go to the archives and type in mosquitos. The article was run on 6/1/02 - This will get a newer article on the mosquito magnet too.
The coolest thing was a kid doing a high school project with his dad (an acoustical engineer). They found a frequency that, when transmitted in areas of standing water, ruptures mosquito larvae. According to the article, they are pursuing patents at this time.
I live on a shallow lake surrounded by freshwater marsh - I want one of those mosquito magnets, but 1200 is a bit steep. Considering all the stink about West Nile Virus, it will probably be a while before the price comes down.
Steelkilt Lives!
jim.. i think the Liberty model is about $400.. True Value or the big box.. the liberty needs an ac power source.. the more expensive models don't and they clean out a larger area..
if you live in the burbs... with smaller house lots, . and a Liberty at most of the houses.. they'll clean out the whole block....
one of the resort test areas from about two years ago.. had a picture of a 30 gal. garbage can full of dead mosquitos from one trap
Mike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
Edited 8/16/2002 7:03:27 AM ET by Mike Smith
If yer bluebird houses were invaded by sparrows, you may have made the entrance hole too big.
And make sure you don't put a perch on the bird house.........
It's a good thing we have gravity, or else when birds died they'd just stay right up there. Hunters would be all confused.
Well, for something different...
I live on a lake, there are parts of shore that are somewhat boggy and make great skeeter breeding grounds. So, we have them here.
On the back of my house...facing SSW...I have a 2-level bluestone patio. Total size of the two levels is about 1300 sq ft. As you can guess, this sucker absorbs it's share of solar in the day, to radiate it back in the evening and night.
If you walk around my yard in late afternoon/early evening, the skeeters attack. Step on the patio, they keep a distance. I'm not sure if it's the dryness, the subtle radiating heat of the bluestone that keeps them at bay, or what.
But it works.
The patio isn't hot either...quite comfortable. Though around 1:00-2:00am when the patio is cooler, they'll start in on the patio.
We have a mosquito magnet - it seems to work pretty well. It goes through a 20# tank of propane in about 3 weeks of constant running. The octenol cartridge lasts longer.T. Jeffery Clarke
Quidvis Recte Factum Quamvis Humile Praeclarum
(Whatever is built well, no matter how humble, is noble)
Thanks for the interesting replies. There seem to be three general groups of opinion: Add an vestibule entry system, attract natural mosquito predators to reduce the population, and install mechanical predators.
Two of these we will certainly use and will consider the third if necessary.
thanks
We lived in Glasgow, MT from 1963 to 1967. Bad mosquito country. They were annoying enough in town, where the city regularly sprayed them, much worse out of town. And toxic. For the first week or so of mosquito season, a bite would raise a really impressive welt. Later in the season we got habituated to it. We had friends with a truck garden outside of town, in an oxbow bend in the river, so there was river on three sides. It was very bad there, especially when we went to pick corn at 4:30 AM to get it to market early. (Summer sunrise comes very early at that latitude.) I remember walking along behind a friend and seeing literally hundreds of mosquitos on his back. People tended to wear denim, even when it was too hot for denim.
Well the point of all this is that even though I was a kid, I wasn't oblivious to the mosquitos. They were there, and they bit me, but I don't remember ever having a problem with them getting in the house. We had enclosed front and back porches. Most peoples' houses did, but the point was to keep the cold air out in the winter, not not to keep the mosquitos out, at least not that I ever knew about. If we held the screen door open and got yelled at, it was for letting flies in, not mosquitos. So yes, you'll be better off if you can keep them away from the house, but if the population pressure close to the house is not too high, the airlock entry scheme seems to be quite effective.