Neatorama » pest

Bed Bugs: No Area Unbitten!

Alex — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 06:33:33 +0000

Forget Twilight vampires, the bloodsucking scourge that is spreading like wildfire in the United States is the bed bug:

The tiny, sneaky insects are spreading so rapidly across the United States that almost no region or area is unbitten, a new survey suggests. Calls to exterminators nationwide about bed bugs are up 57 percent nationwide in the last five years, according to a new survey by the National Pest Management Association and the University of Kentucky. More than 95 percent of 519 U.S. exterminators participating in the survey reported finding at least one bed bug infestation in the past year.

Link

Previously on Neatorama: Bedbugs attack Hollister | What’s Eatin’ You?

Homemade Spider Catcher

Miss Cellania — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 18:50:11 +0000

I don’t know how effective this homemade spider catcher is, but it should be easy to make from a cassette case, a pipe, a string, and some glue. Beats walking into a web, the way I’ve been doing lately! Link -via Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories

Next in Australia’s Battle Against Cane Toads: Meat Ants. What Could Go Wrong?

Alex — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 06:09:16 +0000

Ah, Australians. First they introduced cane toads to hunt the greyback cane beetle pests – but the toads turned out to be a much bigger pest and their toxic kill many native predators and farm animals.

Now, there’s a proposal to control the cane toad population by introducing yet another species to battle it: meat-eating ants.

Omnivorous meat ants are native to Australia and reportedly nests in groups of more than 60,000. Professor Rick Shine said that meat ants attack and eat toads. "The ants are moving through these open areas, scavenging for dead insects and so on. If they encounter a baby toads it obviously seems like an appropriate lunch and jump on it. "

What could go wrong? Link [National Geographic Video]