As we grow our gardens and orchards around the world we find an ever increasing problem with things that target us and not our plants.
#1 mosquitos
Malaria and yellow fever are very real problems in some locations The Most Dangerous Mosquito Species | Mosquito Control Experts -
Genetically Modified Mosquitoes | Mosquitoes | CDC.
#2 ticks
#3 chiggers
Damn chiggers anyway.
I never had chiggers in the yard growing up in this part of California. But now we get them in summer, some years worse than others.
Ticks and mosquitos are more dangerous than chiggers but all 3 come in large numbers. It is my understanding that some locations can have fleas and other pests in large numbers as well.
How about fire ants, spiders, wasps, bees the list goes on…
Good points some people do have yellow jacket problems. Have never had the pests you mentioned here personally.
A guy i worked with many years ago grew a nice row of pole beans … and the first picking done by his wife… she unfortunately found a rather large red wasp nest in the green bean canopy… got several stings.
I do some forest farming myself… and yes ticks chiggars skeeters… poison ivy, stinging nettle, wasp, yellow jackets, hornets, copper heads, rattlesnakes… and in creek or riverbottom areas cotton mouth.
ive been all around the country but ive yet to find a place that has as much a variety of biting flies that we have here. we have mosquitos, black flies, noseeums, horseflies, deer flies and moose flies. around water bodies from early june to sept. they blot out the sky and are enough to drive you insane! came across a article in outdoor life written in the 1950’s by these 2 fishermen from M.A that came to northern Maine on a fishing trip in June. it was quite hilarious and colorful how they described and loathed our biting insects. no amount of fly repellent stops them.
At my cottage on Russell Island one year we had very heavy rains. Everything was flooded. It took us weeks to pump all the water out. During that time the mosquitoes which are very bad normally were extreme. Since sound travels on water, maybe because of the flooding? You could hear them, millions of mosquitoes. This low buzz was very audible, very strange!
So I grew up there and when the mosquitoes were out the minnows would come out to eat any unlucky mosquito. Wind etc. would blow them in. Plus they lay eggs in water. Anyway the walleye would come for the minnows and I would come for the walleye. I would cast off docks. The walleyes come into shallow water. Doing this all my life I have been bitten so many times by mosquitoes I no longer react at all. No bumps, no itching, no reaction whatsoever. Like allergy shots, thousands of times…
Had a friend who was absolutely plaqued by botflies in Mississippi. The maggot lives under the skin of the person and their dogs. It has to be cut out! Botflies in Dogs (Warble Fly / Wolf Worm / Cuterebra in Dogs) | PetMD
living here you either accept the bites or go nuts trying to avoid them. they love my wife. she swats at them, drawing more in. lol! that’s why i prefer to fish out of a boat as they aren’t as bad on the lake or river. black flies key in on blood so they will bite you in the same spot as long as you let them , turning your neck and ears into a bloody mess.
We thought we were safe from some of those southern insect pests here in NYS, but reports are some have already arrived and others are on their way.
I got a botfly larva in my scalp in the Peace Corps. Still enjoy telling that story and grossing people out. The local health center nurse tried a folk remedy of blowing cigar smoke across its breathing hole and squeezing super hard. Spoiler alert… it didn’t work. But the clinic in town just numbed me up and cut it out. Then asked if I wanted to keep it. Lol. Uhhhh, no thanks.
I remember that terrible itch from when I lived in Texas. Luckily, no chiggers in Oregon.