This weekend I put "mosquito dunks" into several areas of standing water around our yard: the reservoir under the fountain in the front yard (which we have never turned on), the bird bath in the front, and the trays under several large pots on the deck. The "dunks" have a non-toxic-to-people-and-mammals ingredient that kills mosquito larvae, and they slowly release it over 30 days or so. I broke one into small pieces since all of the areas I treated were less than 1 square foot in surface. While there are a million other places that mosquitoes can and do breed in our yard (I am told they are fond of liriope and English ivy, and we have an abundance of both), I hope this will help the problem. I could see the larvae in the fountain reservoir, so that will definitely make a difference.
In other vermin news, I stomped two more hatches of lubbers over the weekend, and we've seen more of the native large cockroaches ("palmetto bugs"/"water bugs") in the house - one flew at me this morning! Ant traps have slowed the initial sugar ant invasions of the spring. We're talking about getting the crawl space/basement perimeter sprayed for roaches, to at least reduce their incidence, without getting as much pesticide inside our living space. We also need to keep up the annual termite treatment that our house's previous owner mentioned. Lavendar Pest Control has been recommended as a local business of good repute, so I guess we need to give them a call.
In good news, I don't think I'm hearing any Ceiling Squirrels any more, and I no longer open kitchen cabinets in fear that a possum may hiss at me. So we've established a perimeter against the larger classes of home invaders; we just need to work on the smaller ones.
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