Insect stings are little more than painful nuisances for most people. But for others, the venom from insects can cause severe allergic reactions and even death. That’s according to a joint task force of the American College of Allergy, Asthma and …
Pests in the NewsJune 17, 2011
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Council powerless to deal with rodent infestation after shutting its pest …
This is Total Essex Climbing garden fences, hiding in trees and scurrying through lawns in Marlborough Road, Pilgrims Hatch, the vermin are roaming free in the absence of Brentwood council's axed pest control service. Pilgrims Hatch Residents concerned about rats coming … |
Pests in the NewsJune 17, 2011
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House infested with rats despite pest blitz
ChronicleLive The family have been suffering from an infestation of the pests for more than a month despite a blitz by pest controllers. Ms Onwurah said: “I was amazed and disgusted to find that, in 2011, Your Homes Newcastle apparently think it is acceptable for a … |
Pests in the NewsJune 17, 2011
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 Baltimore Sun |
Ash tree pest reaches outskirts of B'more
Baltimore Sun (blog) The emerald ash borer, an invasive pest from Asia that's been wreaking havoc in ash trees in southern Maryland and up and down the East Coast, has now been spotted in Howard County – the first detection in the Baltimore area. … DCNR offers pointers regarding exotic pestsWilkes Barre Times-Leader USDA sets traps for emerald ash borer beetleGazetteNET Emerald Ash Borer Found in Howard Co. for the First TimeSouthern Maryland Online ReadMedia (press release) –Rochester Democrat and Chronicle –Open File all 98 news articles » |
Pests in the NewsJune 17, 2011
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WOWK |
Ash Boring Beetle Found in 5 More W.Va. Counties
WOWK “The discovery of emerald ash borer in five more West Virginia counties shows how easily these non-native insects move,” said Commissioner of Agriculture Gus R. Douglass. “We need to focus on ways to prevent the spread of these insects, such as using … |
Pests in the NewsJune 17, 2011
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QUESTION:
One of my technicians brought a bug in today that I simply cannot identify. Unfortunately it looks quite terrifying. The bug is about 3 inches long and woody in color. Mostly gray with some brown mixed in. The head and neck area are just a bit more than 1/2″ long with the head being twice the width of the neck. Eyes are on either side of the head and two very long heavy duty mandibles that are curved backward at the ends. The wings are about 2 inches long and heavily veined, each pair being about equal in length.From the bottom the bug’s head and neck area are equal to half its body length. The thorax is twice the width of the neck and the abdomen and is tapered. I thought it might be some type of Mantis but cannot find anything that looks similar.
ANSWER:
Normally I shy away from making a definite ID based on just a description, but your description is so beautifully detailed that it is clear to me that you have a male Dobsonfly, a beneficial insect in the family Corydalidae. The male has those amazingly long and curved mandibles and some references say it can inflict a painful bite while other references state the muscles controlling these mandibles are too weak to do much with respect to biting people, and the mandibles are used more for hanging onto the female during mating. But, they are really intimidating, aren’t they, along with the huge size of the adult insect. The female looks identical but has much smaller mandibles, and she definitely could give a painful pinch with them if she were handled carelessly.
The larva of the dobsonfly is equally impressive, and for the Eastern Dobsonfly – Corydalus cornutus – it may be as long as 3.5 inches, with strong mandibles of its own. We call the larva a Hellgrammite and it lives under rocks in flowing streams where it feeds on a variety of other aquatic insects that it finds, including those of black flies, so we should thank it for its effort. The larva definitely is capable of giving a painful pinch too. They are used as fish bait and may be raised in captivity and sold in fishing supply stores. The fully developed larva often leaves the water and crawls a short distance over land to find a secluded place to pupate, so they may even be discovered under objects on the soil. The adults may not feed in nature and live only a few days, but during that time they commonly come to lights at night just to scare the bejeebies out of people.
University references on these fascinating insects suggest that there is NO reason to kill them, and given the benefit the larvae provide they should be preserved and enjoyed. Just don’t plan on holding one in your bare hand unless you are prepared for the defensive bite.
Pest QuestionsJune 17, 2011
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Whether it is weeds, insects, diseases, or other pests there is always an annoyance that keeps a gardener busy. In fact, I call pests my job security. What makes it even more challenging is the fact that the pests are always changing. What was a problem …
Pests in the NewsJune 14, 2011
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Many objects made up of wood, paper and textiles are seriously damaged by a variety of pests and often such damages are irreversible. Most disinfestations methods involve the use of chemical agents, which may have significant effects of environmental …
Pests in the NewsJune 14, 2011
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QUESTION:
I know that DOT (disodium octaborate tetrahydrate) is extremely effective against urban pests. Why and how does it truly work?
ANSWER:
A quick seminar on borates. The original material is a mineral called Borax, and this is mined from the ground. I don’t know if it is still around, but as a kid we used soap called Boraxo, and there were TV ads for “20-Mule Team Borax”, depicting long mule trains pulling carts filled with this mined material. Borax is used for many other reasons, but it also is known to be toxic to insects, so it is refined for pest management. One misconception (bald faced lie??) that is spread on the Internet is that borates and boric acid are “non-toxic” to people, and thus are good “alternatives” to those nasty toxic pesticides. This is dangerously false, as borates and boric acid are quite toxic to humans and pets and often used at nearly pure concentration.
The least refined is the Borates, which are essentially borax, composed of sodium, boron, and oxygen. The borax can be highly refined to a crystalline material that we call Boric acid, and it also is known as orthoboric acid, another name for the same thing. The “borates” go by the names Sodium Tetraborate Pentahydrate (Boracide Powder), Sodium Tetraborate Decahydrate (Terro and Intice baits), and Disodium Octaborate Tetrahydrate (Nibor dust, Gourmet baits, BoraCare, Timbor, Borasol, etc.). These are all extremely similar but with slightly varying molecular makeup.
However, in ANY of its refined forms the boric acids and borates are stomach poisons, and they must be ingested to affect an insect. Therefore, those arthropods that do not have the ability to ingest the active ingredient are not going to be killed by boric acid dusts or borates on surfaces, and this includes blood feeders such as bed bugs and mosquitoes, or other insects that feed with a sucking mouth. The exact mechanism by which the borate actually kills the insects seems to be a little unclear, even now after many decades of use of these products for insect control. However, somehow the borate interferes with the proper digestion or metabolism of the food eaten by the insect and eventually the insect, in a sense, starves to death. It is possible that the borate affects microorganisms in the gut of the insect (bacteria and protozoa) that are responsible for helping with the digestion of the insect’s food, and in this manner interrupt proper digestion. We know that termites and roaches have these symbiotic colonies of microorganisms in their gut, and that without them they would have difficulty digesting wood and other materials they eat.
I have asked some of our most respected experts whether or not borates also have any desiccant action on insects – in other words, could the dust get onto the exoskeleton of the bug and cause it to dehydrate in the same manner that silica gel and diatomaceous earth dusts do, and the answer has been a firm “No”. Boric acid is toxic only if ingested, despite claims you find on the Internet that say otherwise.
If we apply boric acid or borates onto a surface they remain there for many, many years – perhaps forever – because we are essentially applying a mineral that simply does not change over time. The dust formulations need to stay dry in order to impinge on the passing arthropod, but formulations that we can apply to wood such as soluble powders or liquid concentrations will then be effective on any insect that consumes that treated wood, and this will remain effective for a very long time. Many of these spray-applied products, mixed with water, only rest on the surface of the wood, and cannot penetrate into the wood any further than the water will carry it, which may be only a fraction of an inch. Some formulations, such as BoraCare, may have solvents in them that enable the borate to move very deeply into the wood, and this could be a huge advantage in preventing WDO attack on that wood.
The female powderpost beetle deposits her eggs by sliding her ovipositor down into a crevice in the wood, and this may bypass a surface treatment of the borate. But, if the borate has moved deeply into the wood the larva is going to feed in that treated zone at some point, and be killed. Termites that find access to wood by bypassing soil treatments will still end up feeding on borates within the wood. Even fungi will be killed when they feed on borates, so it can be toxic to both plant and animal organisms.
Pest QuestionsJune 14, 2011
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The gypsy moth is one of the most destructive leaf pests in the United States. The BTK treatment has been used for years in an effort to control this foreign nuisance. “It’s been a product that has been used for more than 70 years. It’s been used in the …
Pests in the NewsJune 13, 2011
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