{"id":402,"date":"2012-01-29T15:35:36","date_gmt":"2012-01-29T20:35:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/haughtypenguin.com\/?p=402"},"modified":"2012-01-29T21:54:36","modified_gmt":"2012-01-30T02:54:36","slug":"hiring-insect-management-you-green-small-and-amphibious-apply-via-comment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/haughtypenguin.com\/?p=402","title":{"rendered":"Hiring: Insect management. You: Green, small and amphibious. apply via comment"},"content":{"rendered":"

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which shall be hired? why not all of the above?<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Sundew<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

With my ventures in cultivating tropical plants and building a koi pond indoors, I’ve noticed that I also somehow generate hundreds of gnats. I assume it may be from\u00a0over-watering, decaying vegetation. Maybe if I keep the area cleaner, this wouldnt be an issue. Now they are running amuck on the 1st floor as well as the second floor. In the past I thought it would be a genius idea to start keeping carnivorous plants as well (mainly sundews). Logic dicates that the gnats would be controlled with these predatory photosynthesizers. It actually worked fairly well, but I was too cheap to keep them in a proper container. They actually grew too well and caught a lot of gnats. Then the gnat level died down and I am not sure what happened, but I could not keep my precious bug eaters alive. I think part of the problem was my basement was 1. too cold, 2. too dry.<\/p>\n

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nasty fungus gnat<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

With the winter upon us, I deal with the insect annoyance I have today. I have my Prized Mango and Coffee plant on the 1st floor, and noticed that gnats have been haunting the soil. This is putting MommyMD<\/a> on edge, so I finally set up this portable bug zapper<\/a>\u00a0she had purchased. It actually seems to be working, because every so often you will hear a zap. This (for whatever reason) scares the crap out of Combo (the Pomeranian). The gnats dont seem to be terribly attracted to the light, so I’d say it somewhat works. What has worked in the past (aside from the Sundews) was using insect sticky tape, so we went to HomeDepot and got some. In the basement I am getting ready to plug in another bug zapper as well. I’d rather use a Sundew, but if I order one online, I am afraid the cold weather will kill it in-transit.<\/p>\n

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kermit<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

So this brings me to another idea, the motivation of this post. What about putting a frog in the pond? Obviously a thought is that the frog will jump out and disappear. I say this is a non issue. 1. The frog will want to stay by the water. If it leave, it will come back sooner or later (I mean he’s stuck in my basement). 2. Kermit will want to go to where the food is, and the gnats are around the pond. I mean how could this be a bad idea?<\/p>\n