Problem is bats are nocturnal. Most areas with mosquitoes have a large variety, some active at different times of day or night. Bats will not do in the daylight or early dusk mosquitoes.
As a note, some years ago, I was an official mosquitoes collector. A single trap caught over 200 varieties of mosquitoes in upstate NY!
After my share of cynicism...
Darned well here - 1 acre lot on MA.
gerry
It's not like you have to clean out the houses every day or week. Once a season and plug the holes.
Hell, we had a storm blow the roof off a Martin house, which wasn't replace for two days, they were fine, although I was worried about owls and hawks eating buffet style.
What, mites? Simple keep things clean, diatomaceous earth.
So can dogs cats and skunks and possums and many other mammals. I'd say that in a population of 17 million bats there MAY be one with rabies. Can the same be said for 17 million skunks? I don't think so.
I understand the myth killing, but to demonize the flying critters is counter productive. They eat flying insects. A GOOD thing.
Last evening, while working on my boat, I watched the Swallows and Martins. They were active until AT LEAST civil twilight. I was aware of at least three mosquitos during this time, they were trying to bite my calfs. They were all active at the same time. However, when the Martins and Swallows finally settled down, the Nighthawks appeared. They also eat flying insects.
All these birds eat WHATEVER insect presents itself in their flightpath. Same for bats.
These are good, but -seriously- go to:
No, bats and swallows and Martins are not VORACIOUS consumers of mosquitos, but that is not a good enough excuse to convince folks NOT to encourage them to be around or to -fear- them.
I have handled several species of bats with no ill effects. I have seen dozens of albino bats (that's one per million). I know no one who has contracted rabies from a bat. I have been in bat caves. The worst I have seen of bats is the potential hystoplasmosis found on guano (rat feces also). I have friends that have waded through waist deep vampire bat ooze while spelunking, with no ill effects, but that's a whole different story...
I must get the brand my brother-in-law has. Very quiet and does not hove the power shutdown issue.
His uses a standing propane flame, Mosquito Magnets use a catalytic device & optionally odorants targeted for specific areas of the country. The odorant made no difference in my case. I called the company and they mentioned the odorant varies by region and targets some other biting insects. The odorant I had emulates ox breath!
Note, oxidize propane and you get the same byproducts via flame or hot catalytic device.
gerry
Notes:
- Octenol is not used to target mosquitoes - I called them and they do not recommend it for my area/
- newer units have a clean out mechanism to help solve the starting problem
- Being catalytic, the catalyst will age and fail. Makes me interested in the standing flame units offered by others.
gerry
:Sorry if someone already mentioned this, which I read on a household ;tips page last week (I haven't tried it): :"Put some water in a white dinner plate and add a couple drops of Lemon ;Fresh Joy dish detergent. Set the dish on your porch, patio, or other :outdoor area. Not sure what attracts them, the lemon smell, the white ;plate color, or what, but mosquitoes flock to it, and drop dead shortly :after drinking the Lemon Fresh Joy/water mixture, and usually within ;about 10 feet of the plate. Check this out---it works just super! May :seem trivial, but it may help control mosquitoes around your home, ;especially in the South and elsewhere where the West Nile virus is :reaching epidemic proportions in mosquitoes, birds, and humans."
See
Its quite a show at sunset isn't it?
Yes, very neat (stinky too)!
The REAL show is at Bracken - bigger-better-faster-stronger! It's like a
50 foot wide tornado rising out of the sinkhole to treetop level, where it runs off over the trees like a river for a mile or two. The Red Tailed hawks come in and snatch them out of the aerial stream for snacks! I've even witnessed rattlesnakes grabbing them out of the air from the entrance wall. Every now and then you can see the rare albinos in the vortex, they stick out well against the dark wall of bats. These are Mexican Freetail bats. They winter in South America, although a small few stay year around in the cave.A fellow here in central Texas, has created a man made bat cave. He enlisted the help of the Bat Conservancy to design it. The whole purpose was to mine guano. He laid a concrete slab of a couple of acres and used rebar and steel to build domes, which he then gunnited and then he buried the whole thing in earth (basically an upsidedown pool). The entrance is just large enough for a front-end loader to go in and scoop the poop. It's been very successful.
There is another cave at Kickapoo Caverns State Park that has a very nice bat flight, Stewart Bat Cave. I did some volunteer work there at the cave for the Park service a few times. It used to be a shelter for goats and sheep!
Yet another bat flight is at an old railroad tunnel out near -I wanna say- Beorne? or is it Frederickburg? I've not visited that one.
The railroad tunnel is between Boerne and Fredericksburg. Beautiful rolling hills. Nice drive.
Jeepers wrote:
My neighbor in south Anne Arundel County, MD, had a purple martin house and managed to attract and keep a nice colony of the birds. Unfortunately, they moved and took the bird house with them.
Instructions and info at
nosredna wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@news-central.dca.giganews.com:
Of course you haven't. If you had, you would know it does not work.
(original poster here) Yuk, yuk! I mighta known it was a hoax!
On Thu, 08 Jul 2004 11:51:55 -0400, gerry wrote (with possible editing):
...snip
That's surprising, since they told me just the opposite. Regardless, the units both do seem to attract the two worst pests up here in northern NH: black flies and mosquitoes.
Yes, they do, one of ours (a replacement for the unit which died) has that built in. However, the clean out mechanism requires the purchase of CO2 cylinders, which are hard to get in our area. They are available, however, on special order through NAPA auto parts stores.
The catalyst is allegedly platinum. Interesting that you say it will age and fail. American Biophysics has never told (perhaps "admitted" is a better word!) that and I think I would have been disinclined to purchase the units at about $1200 each if I had known they had a limited lifespan. Do you know how many operating hours they are supposed to last ?
Thanks, Gerry,
Don't you have bars and resturants? They use CO2 to dispense soft drinks and beer. Try a welding store or a resturant supply. You may have to buy the first cylinder and swap it out each time but they will usually just rent you one.
s, they do, one of ours (a replacement for the unit which died) has
Do you have any bicycle stores in your area? The threaded CO2 cartidges are used in some CO2 bike tire inflaters and they may stock them.
dickm
I tried it as of yesterday. In a few hours since it looked like rain I moved the plate under the eave. It had a small mosquito in it at that time. This morning i checked it and there were 4 dead mosquitos in it.....all small. Does that mean males? The biters around here have a wingspan of about 1 1/2 inches.
I am looking for a natural mosquito repellant. Not 'natural' as in a tube or spray of something at the store for $5 but natural as in what might be around the house.
FACE
ONE AND A HALF INCHES!? Man I dunno....
Curious about the high frequency noisemakers that are sold to repel mosquitos. I tend to just ignore them but now even Costco sells them.
I t would seem to be possible to set up a test of their ability to do what they say they do yet I have never seen the results of such a test. Don't think Consumer Reports has addressed them even in a back- handed one sentence way. Anyone have any real information on them ?
would a baseball "bat" work on mosquitoes?
"Let's eat him in here. If we carry him outside the big guys will take him."
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