Tuesday, May 20, 2008

I'm So Bugged!

Literally! Boxelder Bugs are taking over our home! It's like an insect horror movie called "Invasion of the BoxElder Bugs" at our house. We've lived here for almost three years now and this happens every year when it starts to get really warm. We have a creek behind our house and lots of trees in our back yard and I'm pretty sure that's where the bugs come from. Anyway, we start to notice them each year around our back windows--which includes the the kitchen, dining room, living room, our bedroom and bathroom windows and several of the downstairs windows as well. It's wierd because our home is only 3 years old and all the screens are in really good shape but these bugs still they work their way in through the screens and get stuck and die between the screen and window and just pile up until we remove them. Then there are those of them that actually work their way inside past the screen and closed window. We find them climbing all over the place. I have no idea how they get in. All I can figure is they must be able to make themselves pretty small or they are just very clever.

I go between being compassionate to them and picking them up with a paper towel and putting them back outside to being grossed out and flushing them down the toilet. It just depends on where I find them and how many I've had to deal with that day. Grrr. Their excrement stains the walls and counters and it drives me nuts--especially now that I have a baby in the house and am trying to keep things sterilized.

If I don't deal with them right away--or if I don't see them when they first come in, they die on their own within a few hours or at most within a day and then I find their dead carcasses everywhere. It is just so disgusting!

The other day I walked out on our back deck and looked up at the back of our house and it was covered with boxelder bugs. I mean thousands and thousands of them literally covered the back walls of the house. When I saw that, I realized it was no small wonder so many of them were coming inside. There was no room left for them on the outside wall! When hubby gets back we are definitely going to have to de-bug the back of the house and our windows! I can't stand being BUGGED!

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