How do you get rid of noisy crickets in our backyard?
Hardiness Zone: 10a
By JayJayKay from Los Angeles, CA
Add your voice! Click below to answer. ThriftyFun is powered by your wisdom!
Short of poisoning the heck out of your back yard, (and what an ecological disaster, not to mention the potential harm to you, kids, pets, beneficial insects, birds, reptiles, amphibians....), I am not sure there is much you can do to discourage them outdoors. If you have any heavily mulched or untrimmed areas that might be harboring them, you could try to trim or use a stone mulch there. (Eliminate food sources and hiding places.) Good luck.
We had the same problem this summer. They were all over the place this year. All over outside, so loud they would wake us up. Then they started getting in the house too! It was driving us crazy, it was like camping outside in a loud field! It was just getting worse & worse.
We'd had this problem a few years ago & got 'cricket bait' granules at Walmart, but I couldn't find anything anywhere this year. Finally, at Ace Hardware I found "Terro Multi-Purpose Insect Bait". It is long lasting, weather resistant & works on ants, cockroaches, crickets, earwigs, silverfish, slugs & snails. The stuff I found was in a 3 lb. shaker can with a handle so you could hold it at the top & shake the granules out of the bottom.
I went around the entire outside perimeter of the house shaking the stuff against the base of the house. I also took a plastic spoon & tossed a few granules near the doors & behind the bookcase in the room where we were getting them (our bedroom!) & kept the door shut so the cat wouldn't get in there. Literally within 24 hours the sound of singing crickets was nearly gone! We found only 1 dead cricket, but within the week, we achieved peace again & so far it's been about a month & it's stayed that way!
If you have pets that like to catch & eat crickets, be very careful as this is not supposed to be used indoors & they could catch a poisoned cricket.
The Chinese believe it is very very bad luck to kill a cricket. Why did you move there if you don't like the wildlife?
The Chinese also hold a festival called Yulin once a year and eat dog meat... I'll take my chances and kill some noisy bastard crickets
What? Who said anything about moving anywhere?
Add your voice! Click below to answer. ThriftyFun is powered by your wisdom!
I am lucky to have a source from the local race track for straw that has been in the stalls, and enriched by the horses for mulching my garden. I love not having to pull weeds, and then tilling it into the soil in the fall to enrich the soil. But it has caused one effect that I need some help with.
Last summer, I had a hard time growing pole beans because they were eaten off as soon as the poked up out of the soil. I blamed the rabbits at first, bun then discovered that my straw mulch was hiding lots of crickets, and they were observed chewing on my young bean plants. I would like to treat my garden with something to deter the crickets.
Would it help to put down something on the ground before I add the mulch, and what would work best? I use insecticides sparingly, but I do use them when nothing else works. I am thinking a little Sevin dust under the mulch might work. But I am definitely open to other suggestions.
Hardiness Zone: 7b
Harlean from Hot Springs, Arkansas
To get rid of crickets take jars the size of a quart jar and drop in a couple pieces of torn white bread. Set around anywhere you think you might have crickets. They hop in for the bread and can't get out. Then take the kids fishing and let them get hooked on a good thing. Food, togetherness, fresh air, Mother Earth, etc. If you have kids some day you'll never regret it. I know.
Happily loved mother of 3 beautiful sons. (03/28/2008)
By mbwright
I am lucky to have a source from the local race track for straw that has been in the stalls, and enriched by the horses for mulching my garden. I love not having to pull weeds, and then tilling it into the soil in the fall to enrich the soil. But it has caused one effect that I need some help with.
Last summer, I had a hard time growing pole beans because they were eaten off as soon as the poked up out of the soil. I blamed the rabbits at first, bun then discovered that my straw mulch was hiding lots of crickets, and they were observed chewing on my young bean plants. I would like to treat my garden with something to deter the crickets.
Would it help to put down something on the ground before I add the mulch, and what would work best? I use insecticides sparingly, but I do use them when nothing else works. I am thinking a little Sevin dust under the mulch might work. But I am definitely open to other suggestions.
Hardiness Zone: 7b
Harlean from Hot Springs, Arkansas
To get rid of crickets take jars the size of a quart jar and drop in a couple pieces of torn white bread. Set around anywhere you think you might have crickets. They hop in for the bread and can't get out. Then take the kids fishing and let them get hooked on a good thing. Food, togetherness, fresh air, Mother Earth, etc. If you have kids some day you'll never regret it. I know.
Happily loved mother of 3 beautiful sons. (03/28/2008)
By mbwright
My son has crickets in the basement he would like to get rid off them. Please advise what to use, thanks.
Evelyne from Toronto, Canada
When not in use always try to keep your drains plugged. If you don't have enough plugs a Pringles lid or powdered ice tea lid will work as well. I also use glue traps, so far I've caught 5 of them annoying things. (09/20/2007)
By Christine IN
This summer, we began getting crickets in the basement. We think they entered through a crack in our new addition. One week, we'd hear what we thought was one or two, but as the weeks passed, just opening the door to the basement seemed as if we were going into the woods, because there were so many crickets!
We called an exterminator and while we waited for him to find a time to check out out situation, I ran to the local hardware superstore and got a gallon of bug spray.
I sprayed it into the cracks outside our home's foundation and into the walls and ceilings of our basement. Sounds like exhausting work but really, it wasn't.
And guess what: this week, we began to see little, dead crickets along our basement floor, and we no longer hear their "serenade!"
The stuff we bought is called "Bug Stop" and it is made by Spectracide. It cost about five bucks. Pretty efficient way to go, if you ask me :)!
By Anne in Chicago
Use Raid max, I use it in my basement and spray the crickets when i see them. They die in 10-15 seconds. Spray the sill plates of the house and any cracks you see where they can enter the house. They will crawl across the chemical and die real quick. Lasts about 2-3 months. then reapply. (11/10/2007)
By Jeff
I have used roach motels successfully. They don't get every last one but the herd is thinned dramatically. There were very few left after I had the traps out for awhile. The traps do have somewhat of a strong odor but are tolerable. They're also non-toxic. (11/19/2007)
By Phil
