Annoying little moths

[Simon]

I agree about spiders, very helpful insects. As for ants, if you can get borax powder and sprinkle it where they traffic the most, they will take it to the nest as food and kill the entire nest. Borax is toxic but not enough to kill humans. It is used widely as a soap and cleaner.

[Qqmike]

I'll try the Borax, thanks for the tip.

[DoYouKubuntu]

Yes, yours sound like clothes moths.

Right, I agree. BUT, the weird thing, again, is that they were most heavily concentrated in the bathroom.

I don't know why I didn't think of this before, but I had a minor ant problem in my study in my house in South Africa. Not unbearable ... but annoying to have them walking across the keyboard and around the monitor.

(hi Teunis!)

Yeah, I was going to say, "DON'T give Teunis any ideas!!"

Eventually I got some ant traps - a honey-like syrup that supposedly the workers would take back to the nest. I put down two traps.

Nothing. Occasionally an ant would check them out, but no more so that anything else.

The next day: nothing. I looked at the instructions. "Leave in place for 2-3 weeks."

The next day: a massive column of ants marching from the tiny hole above one window that was clearly their main entrance, via one trap which was on top of a bookshelf, down the bookshelf, to the other trap - clearly, taking the bait back to the nest. All very neat and organised. Hardly any ants anywhere else.

Yes! It's working! I thought. This went on for a few days, then started to thin out a bit.

Then one morning I went into the study ... dead ants everywhere, evenly spread out over the entire floor and all over the bookshelf.

Interesting.

What I do when ants come inside--and they're always in the kitchen, and only when the outdoor temperatures get above 90 or so--I wet a paper towel and then spread some liquid dish detergent on it, and proceed to wipe them up. I follow that with a spray of Orange Guard, which is non-toxic and completely safe to use around pets, food, children, whatever. In a matter of minutes, done!

[DoYouKubuntu]

And I leave spider alone when I see them in the house (except for the poisonous Black Widow type or Brown Recluse)--they catch all kind of insects for me.

I used to be TERRIFIED of spiders...well, really, ALL bugs...but I guess with age, and having lived in states with lots of big, ugly bugs (Florida, Texas), I've mellowed a lot! Back home in Southern California, thankfully, I don't see most of the awful bugs I got used to in Dallas--like flying cockroaches the size of a VW. I do the same thing you do with spiders, just leave them alone. And I've been bitten not once, not twice, but THREE times by black widows. Seriously. The first time I had a violent reaction--vomiting, extreme chills, etc. The second time it was a milder version of that. By the third time, I barely noticed, other than the telltale VERY RED and hot bite area on my ankle. The weird thing is that all three bites were within inches of each other on my right ankle. Years apart, but in the exact same location. If I see a black widow in the house, I put it outside. I've never seen a brown recluse [to my knowledge, anyway], but if I did I'd put it outside, too. All others are welcome to stay in my house, although my cleaning person is conscientious about removing cobwebs.

[jlittle]

... BUT, the weird thing, again, is that they were most heavily concentrated in the bathroom.

Have the conditions been dusty, recently? Condensation from a shower can trap dust, which encourages various molds, and mites that eat them, then the little insects that eat them in turn, though where I live they look like tiny flies, though I've never looked closely. Cleaning off the mold is the only thing one can do; there's cleaners for the job that are essentially household bleach that kill the mold.

Regards, John Little

[DoYouKubuntu]

Have the conditions been dusty, recently? Condensation from a shower can trap dust, which encourages various molds, and mites that eat them, then the little insects that eat them in turn, though where I live they look like tiny flies, though I've never looked closely. Cleaning off the mold is the only thing one can do; there's cleaners for the job that are essentially household bleach that kill the mold.

No, there's nothing like that here.

After living in other states--HUMID states--for years, I had forgotten that back here in Southern California there's just no such thing as mildew, or mold, or anything of that sort that thrives in damp, moist environs. In Dallas...ugh...the shower walls in the bathrooms always had mildew that had to be cleaned off of them, and if you were silly enough to hang something OUTSIDE to dry, well, you'd come back hours later and it'd still be wet...and probably have mildew, too. I'm so glad I'm home!!