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BUGS! - Page 2 — Brooklynian

BUGS!

2

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  • carnivore
    carnivore
    laura wrote: [quote=Carnivore]DEET.
    I'd rather be bitten, thanks.
    Why do you say that?
    That's DEET, not DDT (in case you were confusing the two). It's safe and effective.
    New England Journal of Medicine (full article link above) wrote: Despite the substantial attention paid by the lay press every year to the safety of DEET, this repellent has been subjected to more scientific and toxicologic scrutiny than any other repellent substance. The extensive accumulated toxicologic data on DEET have been reviewed elsewhere.17,35,36,37,38,39 DEET has a remarkable safety profile after 40 years of use and nearly 8 billion human applications.35 Fewer than 50 cases of serious toxic effects have been documented in the medical literature since 1960, and three quarters of them resolved without sequelae.35,37 Many of these cases of toxic effects involved long-term, heavy, frequent, or whole-body application of DEET. No correlation has been found between the concentration of DEET used and the risk of toxic effects. As part of the Reregistration Eligibility Decision on DEET, released in 1998, the Environmental Protection Agency reviewed the accumulated data on the toxicity of DEET and concluded that "normal use of DEET does not present a health concern to the general U.S. population."40 When applied with common sense, DEET-based repellents can be expected to provide a safe as well as a long-lasting repellent effect. Until a better repellent becomes available, DEET-based repellents remain the gold standard of protection under circumstances in which it is crucial to be protected against arthropod bites that might transmit disease.
  • armchair_warrior
    armchair_warrior

    Subject: Re: maybe not fleas

    chub wrote: Fleas are black and oval, but from a side view. Looking down on them they look skinny. They would jump right away the minute you touched them. I've had round hard-bodied mite looking things around the home, but they were red. They moved so slow, I don't know if they bite.

    Speaking of bugs, there were swarming bees on seventh avenue today outside a corner restaurant. I think it was fourth street. It was funny. The police showed up and tried to arrest them. I never saw so many bees flying around.
    i like honey in some of my foods. but i hate bee's :(. i got sting twice in my life. once at my uncles bee farm and another was walking home around sunset park when i was a wee lad.
  • armchair_warrior
    armchair_warrior
    hey wasnt deet develope in ww2?
  • malphigian
    malphigian
    Take a picture and submit it to whatsthatbug.com ( http://whatsthatbug.com/ ).
  • whyfi
    whyfi
    Flexichick wrote: I'm glad that my cats track down any big bugs in my house. They don't kill them (still working on the training issue :lol: ), but at least I know where they are!
    My wife no longer calls for me to kill bugs - she calls for Jack, our cat. He's very effective.
  • lilicrashes
    lilicrashes
    Malphigian - that's a great idea, but it made me throw up in my mouth a little just to look at those things :wink:

    WhyFi - does Jack actually eat them or does he just bat 'em around a bit?

    My cats start "talking" when they see one.
  • laura
    laura
    Carnivore wrote: That's DEET, not DDT (in case you were confusing the two). It's safe and effective.
    http://www.toxicsinfo.org/pests/lyme_deet.htm

    "Consumer Reports printed an article entitled “Protection at a Price-DEET’S Downside”. It points out that: "DEET is readily absorbed into the bloodstream, and medical reports have shown that absorption of DEET sometimes has serious consequences."

    "The point has been made that short-term applications, especially of the lower-strength DEET formulas, do not appear to cause reactions in many people. However, it is my observation that our society tends to minimize or miss the long-term, chronic effects of many chemicals. Over and over, substances thought to be safe are later banned when evidence of their toxicity is finally unavoidable. Years ago, the “safety” of DDT was loudly proclaimed. The popular pesticide Dursban was recently forced off the market after years of use, because of health concerns.

    In addition, research tends to focus on immediate, acute reactions, and examines only individual chemicals, though synergistic effects between multiple substances can be significant. Research is often done by persons with connections to the industry producing a product, raising questions of possible bias. Moreover, it is not unheard of for findings to be stifled, and scientists to find their careers impeded by over-zealous attention to unwelcome results. Product safety is at best an uncertain thing."

    At any rate ... I don't like using chemicals that are absorbed into the skin ... I'm quite sensitive to such things, I've become violently ill (vomiting, convulsions, anaphylactic shock) from such everyday things as hair dye. So ixnay on the DEET for me.
  • whyfi
    whyfi
    Flexichick wrote: WhyFi - does Jack actually eat them or does he just bat 'em around a bit?
    He eats them. Sometimes he plays with them for a bit, sometimes not. Our kitten, Brit (6 months), is starting to respond to us when called, too, so we may start to share the wealth. Although she doesn't yet have the prowess that Jack does, she seems to have even stronger hunting instincts, which is saying quite a bit!
  • laura
    laura
    Flexichick wrote: WhyFi - does Jack actually eat them or does he just bat 'em around a bit?

    My cats start "talking" when they see one.
    My Lucinda is always on bug patrol (she once dispatched a mouse very quickly as well). She bats them a bit and then eats them. Aubrey and Wanda really don't care ... but then Wanda is 15 ...
  • rose
    rose
    laura wrote:

    Yeah, I almost wrote "I associate them with schoolchildren" and then decided not to. But what's up with that? When I was a kid in Detroit nobody had lice.
    They've developed resistance to louse pesticides. (Evolution is real.) When I was a kid, no one I knew got lice, but now they are incredibly common. One of my kids had lice several times when she was little. They spread like crazy in preschools and the younger grades of elementary school. My kids' camp had a major outbreak of lice last summer and they ended up delousing every kid. My head is itching right now just thinking about lice. :(
  • mr. mike
    mr. mike
    I'm feeling itchy now too. :cry:
  • armchair_warrior
    armchair_warrior
    after reading the lice thing :(. my head is now itching....
  • laura
    laura
    Speaking of lice and evolution, scientists have attempted to date the first appearance of clothing (as opposed to wearing animal skins) from the evolution of the body louse (which lives in clothing) from the head louse...
  • armchair_warrior
    armchair_warrior
    laura wrote: Speaking of lice and evolution, scientists have attempted to date the first appearance of clothing (as opposed to wearing animal skins) from the evolution of the body louse (which lives in clothing) from the head louse...
    oh i read that some where. thats how we are nearly hairless :p. except for a few hairy throw back hehe.
  • laura
    laura
    I just made the mistake of looking at headlice.org and now I am feeling rather ill.
    :p
  • laura
    laura
    Back to the original question, perhaps they are cabinet beetles or spider beetles?

    http://extension.missouri.edu/explore/agguides/pests/g07370.htm

    http://ohioline.osu.edu/hyg-fact/2000/2117.html
  • emily
    emily
    To continue the hijack, I once got packed away to a summer camp in MN, where a fellow camper composed and frequently performed a little ditty about the virtues of DEET. I quickly became a true believer.
  • carnivore
    carnivore
    laura wrote: [quote=Carnivore]That's DEET, not DDT (in case you were confusing the two). It's safe and effective.
    http://www.toxicsinfo.org/pests/lyme_deet.htm

    "Consumer Reports printed an article entitled “Protection at a Price-DEET’S Downside”. It points out that: "DEET is readily absorbed into the bloodstream, and medical reports have shown that absorption of DEET sometimes has serious consequences."

    "The point has been made that short-term applications, especially of the lower-strength DEET formulas, do not appear to cause reactions in many people. However, it is my observation that our society tends to minimize or miss the long-term, chronic effects of many chemicals. Over and over, substances thought to be safe are later banned when evidence of their toxicity is finally unavoidable. Years ago, the “safety” of DDT was loudly proclaimed. The popular pesticide Dursban was recently forced off the market after years of use, because of health concerns.

    In addition, research tends to focus on immediate, acute reactions, and examines only individual chemicals, though synergistic effects between multiple substances can be significant. Research is often done by persons with connections to the industry producing a product, raising questions of possible bias. Moreover, it is not unheard of for findings to be stifled, and scientists to find their careers impeded by over-zealous attention to unwelcome results. Product safety is at best an uncertain thing."

    At any rate ... I don't like using chemicals that are absorbed into the skin ... I'm quite sensitive to such things, I've become violently ill (vomiting, convulsions, anaphylactic shock) from such everyday things as hair dye. So ixnay on the DEET for me.
    Toxic though it is, even DDT has saved far more lives from malaria, yellow fever and other mosquito-bourne illness than have ever been harmed by the chemical itself.
    As was stated in the N.E. Journal article, DEET is one of the best studied chemicals we use and has a record of many decades of safety, long enough to have detected any delayed effects such as carcinogenicity. Of course anyone can have an idiosyncratic reaction to anything, but a lot more people have died of anaphylaxis after exposure to peanuts or shellfish than have ever reported any adverse effect of DEET, yet people don't malign the peanut or the shrimp as "toxic". I think this is another case of people fearing what they don't understand.
  • laura
    laura
    Carnivore wrote: Toxic though it is, even DDT has saved far more lives from malaria, yellow fever and other mosquito-bourne illness than have ever been harmed by the chemical itself.
    As was stated in the N.E. Journal article, DEET is one of the best studied chemicals we use and has a record of many decades of safety, long enough to have detected any delayed effects such as carcinogenicity. Of course anyone can have an idiosyncratic reaction to anything, but a lot more people have died of anaphylaxis after exposure to peanuts or shellfish than have ever reported any adverse effect of DEET, yet people don't malign the peanut or the shrimp as "toxic". I think this is another case of people fearing what they don't understand.
    I'm well aware of the lives saved by pesticides. And sure, natural toxins occur in lots of things (like apple seeds). I'm familiar with the pros and cons of DEET ... it's a chemical I don't want in my bloodstream, and since I'm not in danger of dying from malaria or yellow fever I'm not going to use it.
  • carnivore
    carnivore
    laura wrote: I'm well aware of the lives saved by pesticides. And sure, natural toxins occur in lots of things (like apple seeds). I'm familiar with the pros and cons of DEET ... it's a chemical I don't want in my bloodstream, and since I'm not in danger of dying from malaria or yellow fever I'm not going to use it.
    Fair enough. I'll stop harping on this now, but I will leave you with this:
    Paracelsus (Theophrastus Philippus Aureolus Bombastus von Hohenheim) wrote: Alle Ding' sind Gift und nichts ohn' Gift; allein die Dosis macht, das ein Ding kein Gift ist.
    "All things are poison and nothing (is) without poison; only the dose makes that a thing is no poison."
  • carnivore
    carnivore
    laura wrote: Yeah, I almost wrote "I associate them with schoolchildren" and then decided not to. But what's up with that? When I was a kid in Detroit nobody had lice.
    Lice have always been an issue among schoolkids in New York. I remember in elementary school (PS 251), the entire class would be screened with "lice checks" several times a year. Does anyone here remember that part of "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn" when some of the kids in school have lice and Francie's mom soaks here hair in kerosene every day? That book was from the 1940s.
  • laura
    laura
    Carnivore wrote: I'll stop harping on this now, but I will leave you with this: [quote=Paracelsus (Theophrastus Philippus Aureolus Bombastus von Hohenheim)]Alle Ding' sind Gift und nichts ohn' Gift; allein die Dosis macht, das ein Ding kein Gift ist.
    "All things are poison and nothing (is) without poison; only the dose makes that a thing is no poison."
    I think Paracelsus' idea is a bit simplistic ... what about the effects of long-term exposure to small doses, or synergistic effects between substances? But then, he lived in a very different environment than we do now. Still, even as it stands, I don't see how his idea is incompatible with making informed decisions about risk factors (granting that different people will weigh information sources differently), or the personal choice to minimize the use of artificial chemicals in the home and on the body.

    But let's get back to GROSS ICKY BUGS!
  • laura
    laura
    Carnivore wrote: Does anyone here remember that part of "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn" when some of the kids in school have lice and Francie's mom soaks here hair in kerosene every day? That book was from the 1940s.
    Gawd, I'd forgotten about that.
  • diane
    diane

    Subject: bugs

    I am familiar with the little black bugs you have. They seem to arrive
    in the spring and love my oriental rug. Beside killing each one when
    I notice it I haven't figured out what to do about them. I don't think I've
    been bitten by one. There never seem to be alot of them or at least I
    don't look to carefully because I don't want to think I have many..one
    or two bugs I can deal with but a bunch is gross. Same thing with ants
    that seem to arrive around the same time - one ant, no problem but when
    they decide to converge on the tiniest piece of bagel crumb, I actually
    have screamed(lol).
  • anonymous
    anonymous
    We recently had some new bugs too. They look kind of like roaches, but are extremely slow. Most of them have been really small but my wife claims she saw a giant one the other day. I have yet to see it.
  • anonymous
    anonymous

    Subject: I have these, too.

    These little crunchy black sesame seed-like bugs LOVE my bathroom. I find them inching around the floor, and each morning there are 1 or 2 in my bathtub. Where do they come from??

    I've never been bitten, and I rarely find them anywhere but my bathroom. The crunch they make when I squish them is really sad and gross. They're so slow, they have no chance.

    I was SUPER paranoid that they were bed bugs, but they don't look like it.

    I live on the 4th floor. No cats or catnip around. Hmmm...
  • brooklynpotter
    brooklynpotter

    Subject: Re: I have these, too.

    Another Guest wrote: These little crunchy black sesame seed-like bugs LOVE my bathroom. I find them inching around the floor, and each morning there are 1 or 2 in my bathtub. Where do they come from??

    I've never been bitten, and I rarely find them anywhere but my bathroom. The crunch they make when I squish them is really sad and gross. They're so slow, they have no chance.

    I was SUPER paranoid that they were bed bugs, but they don't look like it.

    I live on the 4th floor. No cats or catnip around. Hmmm...
    i know them; had`em in jersey, have them here. (more so earlier in the summer.)

    idon'tknow what they are, buti know what they aren't: mites, fleas, ticks, roaches, bedbugs.
  • amy
    amy
    I found a few of these fuckers near my kitchen window last week.
  • raw
    raw

    Subject: Re: BUGS!

    GuestGuestGuest wrote: This is the third year in a row that little black bugs have invaded my house in the spring/summer.

    They are very small (think sesame seed or smaller), and very black. They have a hard shell andit's often hard to even tell that they are a bug until you see them moving.

    Does anybody know what they are? Also does anybody know a good way to get rid of them? I'm not a big fan of pesticides. I tried Orange Guard spray, which seemed to help in the past, but isn't doing much this time around.

    Oh, and I think they bite.

    I want to KILL THEM! KILL KILL KILL! :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil:
    KILL KILL KILL indeed!! :twisted: :twisted: :twisted: :twisted: :twisted: :twisted: I have no idea what they are, but just reading this has made me start itching and wanting all these bugs to die. :twisted: :twisted: :twisted: :twisted:
  • raw
    raw
    escap wrote: Those sound like bedbugs. There was an article several months ago in the Times that they've spread across the city, and unfortunately, are very difficult to get rid of.
    I heard that there was a citywide invasion of blood-sucking bed bugs. Please don't let this be true. While the threat of terrorists' attacks can't drive me out of Brooklyn, bed bugs will send me running for the hills.
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