Mosquitoes!!

[Ghostrider 67]

It's a bad year for them here in Vermont. Winter too mild, summer too wet. What to do? Clouds of them surrounding my animals and us too. Barn walls coated with them... solutions? I run a large circular fan ( 36") in the barn stall all day for the donkeys and one sheep.

Discuss.

 

[Budnicks]

There's gotta be stagnant water somewhere,
need to get rid of standing water
where you can

tiki torches, not good in a barn
unless you can protect from starting a fire

nasty chemical bug sprays

Ginny foul/hens, eat a crapload of bugs
Or maybe get a Bat company out there,
some do long leases, not real expensive
small boxes hung up, where they will stay during the day
come out at dusk, they eat them by the thousands each
we had both in our old barn/stables, worked well

or electronic zappers
or fires & smoke work some too
not practical really in summer, fire hazards too

we have had it very mild for the mosquitoes, the past like 4 years
not sure why
we just had two really wet winters, especially this last year, unreal

I swell up bad when bitten, big ol' welts

 

[dodgedifferent2]

Our dairy barn gets flies...
Keep air moving and stagnant water away and fly spray. (Hard to get here now because of tree huggers)

Next natural options

Citronella and marigold plants for mosquitos. Marigolds look pretty and deter mosquitos.

Flies are tougher, but they breed in the manure. Clean out barn regularly. Apparently geese are great for eating the larvae; otherwise chickens.
I plant basil up near the house and it is suppose to deter the flies. There are other plants but basil is what I remember off top of my head.

Yes my outdoor sitting area has basil, marigolds and citronella plants. I do have a fountain for the trickling water affect and that water is always moving and I throw in a chlorine puck every so often (bleach works too). Yes I have many other plants in the relaxation zone. Rarely do I sit there but the wife enjoys it.

 

[dadsbee]

5 years now of running a propane mosquito magnet machine and I've pretty much eliminated the colony/cycle from our island. So few now I'm pretty much wasting propane. 20lb tank lasts exactly 30 days.

 

[DeltaV]

Atlas and Ajax deserve to be indoors with you and the Mrs. Just build an addition onto your house if you need more room.

Yes, fans.

I have lots of dragonflies around my house for some reason. They eat mosquitoes.

I've been considering putting up bat boxes.

 

[dodgedifferent2]

Should also add the pour on fly spray. Plan to try it at some point when the stock of spray diminishes.
Revenge Pour-On Synergized Fly and Lice Control

Or the additive to feeds
Feed-through fly control options and the NEW Mineral-lyx^® GAR

 

[moparwacko]

We had several years where you couldn't go outside after dusk because of all the mosquitoes.
Then the dragonflies and bats moved in.
Now we rarely even see one. There are so many dragonflies it looks like JFK, Newark, and O'Hare combined.
There are so many they scare the small grandchildren.
I do not keep old tires around and have no standing water anywhere.
It helps. But mostly I have to say the 4 million or so dragonfly drones are doing their job.

 

[alsant]

There bad here in the high desert and we haven’t had rain for over a month.

 

[Ghostrider 67]

We have many dragonflies here abouts. I do have, and use fly spray/ foggers in the barn but they do nothing against moskeeters. 11 chickens eat a lot of them too, big fan runs in the barn. We have a children's wading pool for the ducks that gets new water and scrubbed out every other day. 3 gallon buckets hanging in two stalls that get renewed daily. Bowl of water for chickens that gets daily clean up.

 

[QuickBpBp]

They are now bad here after all the rain we had recently... Part of living in the country.

 

[Photon440]

Check old cupboards and storage shelves for the good stuff.

 

[Richard Cranium]

 

[dodgedifferent2]

Yes bats consume alot of bugs but encourage the barn swallows to make nests in the barn rafters etc. They eat flies and mosquitos. Also they are a hoot to watch dive bomb cats.

 

[Ghostrider 67]

I'm going shopping today for skeeter spray for the barn. The grass I can just keep cut to drive down skeeter pop's. Nothing I can do about a wet summer after a warm winter.

 

[68gtxman]

@Ghostrider 67 Two things worked for me. One is placement of old plastic jars with dish soap and water in them. The mosquitoes lay their eggs in them and the soap prevents the new mosquitoes from leaving the water jug, so they die. Place them around the perimeter of the protected area, but off the ground so your animals won’t drink from them.

Number 2:

Amazon product ASIN B0B1QXGV4FHang these things around the outside perimeter that you want to protect. They need to be refilled every 30 days and should be hung just prior to the start of your mosquito season (to work best). These devices ferment and give off carbon dioxide, which the mosquitoes can see. This is what attracts them away from the protected zone, so do not hang them in the middle of your occupied space. Initially, buy these (minimum of 4 required, for the minimum four corners of a zone of protection). I mix my own refills: 44 grams sugar, 6 grams salt and a half a thimble of yeast. One batch per container.

 

[Ghostrider 67]

This storm system is not helping. This whole mess rolled up the valley last night. There's a stream running through my pasture this morning.

MSN

 

[Hey-O]

I worked on this old man's house years ago, it was a massive two story colonial. It was in a very private development and each house had a few bat houses on the gable ends. He was **** about those bat houses and he made sure they always had bats in them. He swore they kept the mosquito population down. He wanted me to fix a working shutter on the top most window. I saw what looked like dirt on the wall and thought I'd hose it down first. Yeah right! I stopped counting at about 30, as the bats came pouring out from behind the shutter. Soooo, the next thing I know, I'm installing two bat houses. This house was in town, and I would never have thought of bats to keep the area mosquito free. It worked!!
Cedar Bat House

 

[Richard Cranium]

Here’s what mosquito bites do to me. It’s hard to tell, but in an area of about an inch and a half , it’s red, hot and swelled up. After a couple days, it starts oozing.

 

[Ghostrider 67]

Here’s what mosquito bites do to me. It’s hard to tell, but in an area of about an inch and a half , it’s red, hot and swelled up. After a couple days, it starts oozing.

View attachment 1492285

My wife swells up like a bee sting. They do not bother me very much at all. The only ones that even itch a little are around my ankles. I hardly even use spray on myself. What gets me is the poison parsnip...vines and such too...they bite my wife right through her cloths...

 

[Photon440]

I worked on this old man's house years ago, it was a massive two story colonial. It was in a very private development and each house had a few bat houses on the gable ends. He was **** about those bat houses and he made sure they always had bats in them. He swore they kept the mosquito population down. He wanted me to fix a working shutter on the top most window. I saw what looked like dirt on the wall and thought I'd hose it down first. Yeah right! I stopped counting at about 30, as the bats came pouring out from behind the shutter. Soooo, the next thing I know, I'm installing two bat houses. This house was in town, and I would never have thought of bats to keep the area mosquito free. It worked!!
Cedar Bat House

I built one of those bat houses but so far (this is the second summer) I think it's still unoccupied.