This year, I could not step outside without being tagged three of four times.
Got me two two gallon buckets, filled them with water, refresh them when watering my garden, put a mosquito dunk in each one, placed them at opposite sides of the yard.
Mosquitoes smell stagnant water and lay their eggs in it. The dunks contain a bacteria that eats their larva.
Problem solved in about two weeks.
Death to Mosquitoes! Death to Squash Bugs! Death to Aphids! Death to Earwigs!
-T
I also solved my garden ant problem. You guys want to hear about that?
Mosquito Dunks arerather expensive because each tablet lasts only 30 days.
Because it is live bacteria, you don't know what the bacteria will do when ingested by livestock and pets.
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The best way to control mosquito larvae is to use goldfish or guppy to eat the mosquito larvae.
Goldfish can tolerate cold water so it is good for north and south. Guppy is tropical fish. It is only good if you live in the south.
Feeder goldfish and feeder guppies are extremely cheap in aquarium shops. They are sold in large batches by the dozen or by the hundred. They are sold as live food for larger pet fish.
I once bought 100 goldfish to feed to my Oscar. They sold them 100 at a time and it wasn't much money, although a lot more than fish food.
But I knew nothing and I put them in a second heated aquarium, and they all died, in less than a day iirc, probably in less than in 2 or 3 hours but I wasn't paying attention, wasn't even in the room, so I don't know for sure. IIRC, I scooped them out and gave them to Oscar, figuring they were "fresh killed" so to speak. He ate them all and was fine. What was supposed to be treats for weeks to come was one day's gluttony, but you can't blame him. It was my fault. Then he had to go back to eating fish food.
Well, no. Sometimes I fed him tomato pieces, and sometimes raw liver. I'd buy liver for my own dinner just so I'd have some to give to him. He was about 10" long and he would jump up above the water about 6" when he saw food like that. One time he bit my finger and drew a tiny bit of blood. I miss Oscar.
I was curious how much 100 goldfish would cost now.
It wasn't easy to google.
I tried goldfish for food , goldfish for food for fish and a couple other things and kept getting instructions on how to feel one's goldfish.
Finally one page clued me in. Have to say Feeder goldfish.
Then there were quite a few hits. All of them said the fish were born and raised in the USA. I guess customers don't want some illegal aliens in their aquarium, even for the time it takes to get eaten.
A lot of the pages were hard to understand, seemed to charge the same regardless of the size of the fish.
This oen looked good, much cheaper than the others: Feeders Live Goldfish Pet Food, 100-pk sierrafishandpets.com
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products Feeder...feeder goldfish for sale from shop.sierrafishandpets.com Price : $15.00 · Size : 100-pk but of course the link doens't work. That's what happens when you price yourself too low.
But two pages were clear and one of those was easier to use, guess what? Amazon again. They sell goldfish too.
Ten 0.75-1.5" cost $55. Wow!! $5 a piece for tiny fish. but
100 sell for $76. 1000% as many for under 50% more. And
150 sell for $97 Now we're down to 65c a piece
Most people were happy with them. One said they died quickly but others said they were still alive after 2 weeks.
Amazon has a great disclaimer in the main description: "Please Note The pictures shown are a good representation of our fish, but not the exact fish you will receive. Common goldfish are most commonly orange in color, but can be any combination of orange and black, orange and white, or solid brown or white in color. " Why don't they have a picture of the exact fish I will receive?
I think the ones I bought were only about 1/2 inch, a lot smaller than these..
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sells 500 1.5" for $159 so that's only 32c a piece. I wanted to treat my Oscar but I'm not sure he could catch and swallow more than a couple of these a day. I'll never know.
Most likely the batch of 100 feeder goldfish died from temperature shock. When you bring new fish to a tank, you are supposed to leave the bag of fish floating in the tank for a few hours until the temperature of the water inside the bag and the temperature of the water inside the tank are equalized (almost the same), before you release the new arrival into the tank.
Goldfish are not tropical fish. I'm no expert, but I cannot remember ever seeing a goldfish bowl with a heater. The heat alone may have been too much for them. They survive here in Seattle all winter outside fine.
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