Reconnaissance Stinks!

For four days I have been looking for wasp entry ways into my house, but it has been unseasonably cool and there have been minimal wasp activity outside. The recessed lights are still covered and even though I heard an intense buzzing sound one night; there was no bug body attached to the painters tape.

The pest control guy came out today but with no wasp activity, there was no way to spot their entry point. However, he did see the makings of a larger nest on the top story. Good eyes!

The weather is supposed to warm up this week, so reconnaissance will continue. The threat must be eliminated.

Search and Destroy

I have a problem with wasps in my house. This is my second spring in the house and this is the second spring that I have had problems. It started with just one wasp bumping around the kitchen on a warm day, deluding me into thinking that it came in the house when I opened a door. But every day there was at least one wasp in the house, until one day this spring there were four. That was enough. I killed them all, but not before noticing a wasp emerging from a recessed lighting fixture. It was enough to give me the willies. At that point, I knew I needed professional help.

This was an official search and destroy mission.

The intelligence gathering began as I spoke to the pest control expert. Did I see where they entered into the house? Do I hear buzzing in the walls? Because it wasn’t warm enough to check outside activity, it was decided that I cover the recessed lighting fixtures with painters tape. If the wasps entered from there, the tape will gather the evidence. In other words, I was looking for wasp remains on tape.

This is just day two of that experiment and there have been no wasps in the house. I am much calmer. But the hunt is on for the nest and it must be found. Boastful? No, I just can’t live with the alternative...cohabiting with wasps. This is just the beginning; reconnaissance on wasp habits will continue this week.

Ignorance is Bliss: The Red Shrub

In spite of me…

Ignorance is Bliss.

There is a shrub in my backyard and I have no idea what it is. It is in a raised bed with a coral bell, a plant that looks like a bouquet of oak or maple leaves. The unknown shrub is less than three feet high and has tiny waxy green leaves. On occasion, I have seen brightly colored flowers bloom from it. Two years ago, I cut back the shrub in the fall and the following year there were hardly any blooms, even though I noticed a lot of leaves and buds on the plant. This fall, I didn’t do anything; I even left fall leaves in the raised bed. Earlier this spring, I thoroughly cleaned out the bed, raking out old mulch, weeding and putting in extra dirt. The extra dirt was a tip from a random newspaper article that explained some plants may have to be put back into the dirt after winter because of ground shifts. You will sometimes see plants “pop” out of the ground after winter because of this. I then covered the bed with landscape fabric.

Then I took a break. The weather turned colder and I started to over think my next step. I had originally intended to cover the fabric with mulch, but after buying the bag and reading the instructions, (which states not to put it within several inches of a wooden structure) I was at a lost. But, then I began to notice that both plants were thriving. The coral bell was getting larger and the shrub was blooming. Really blooming! It was covered in tiny red flowers. So, I stopped thinking about the implications of putting mulch so close to a structure and began shoveling it around the base of the plants. A week later, the unknown shrub is still blooming and the coral bell is also flourishing.

What can I say? Did that little bit of TLC in the early spring help? Did the covering of leaves protect the plant? Did it have to rest for a year and gather strength before this bloom fest? I don't know. But I am amazed at the outcome, whether it was with my help or not.

Project Planning: The Garden Wagon

There is always something that can be done in a house. Some project that needs to be started or completed. I have one and a half pages of projects planned. I can dig out plants, prepare interior walls for painting, clean siding, wash windows, etc. I have any number of projects that I can work on at any time and yet, sometimes I am completely stymied.

Usually, it isn’t a particularly difficult project, it’s just something that I haven’t done before and I have to figure out how to do it as I go along. Sometimes, as with all new things I feel incredibly stupid as I bumble around with new tools or attempt putting together something new. This week, I began assembling an “all terrain wagon” I bought several months ago to help me move things around as I garden. Never underestimate items that come pre-assembled!

I took everything out of the 3 foot box it came in and not one piece was pre-assembled! This was going to be a project done from the ground up. After I unpacked everything and read the instructions, I realized that I didn’t have all the tools required to put the wagon together, namely, a wrench, but that didn’t stop me. Once, the project fever hits, I just have to ride it.

Surprisingly enough, it wasn’t that difficult putting the wagon together. I will also say that I was pleased to see it roll around the garage seemingly stable. I then took it outside and rolled it on the lawn to see how it would handle and make sure that all of the wheels stayed on. The wheels stayed on and I can look at this as one project that can be crossed off the list.

Spring Cleaning and the Garage Door, Part II

Tonight I tried to close the overhead garage door. Unfortunately, the garage door would not close. Each time I pressed the opener; the door would slowly roll down, reach the half way point and then reverse itself. It did this several times. I had avoided the garage since Thursday, when I knew that something was wrong with the door. Avoidance is not courageous in the least. In fact, it is quite the punk out. Yes, it’s intimidating being a single woman.

Now, I was forced to work on the door in the cold and the dark. I realized that if the door was up and would not drop, I could always disengage it and let gravity do the work. So, I began looking at obvious problems. Was there a wheel off track? Is the electronic eye breaking? (I cleaned them off with my hand.) Is there too much grease on the track? (I rubbed down the tracks.) Each time I would do something, I would run back and press the opener to see if the problem was fixed and each time the door would come down half way, hesitate and reverse direction.

How many times did I push the button in hopes that the door would go down all the way? Too many! So, I backed my car out of the garage, thinking that if the door stuck or went off track, it would be better for that to happen with the car outside of the garage rather than inside. I then took my purse and things inside the house and ran back out as if I knew what I was going to do. So, I pressed the garage opener one last time and it finally went down all the way. But, it did not go down with out a fight. An inch from the floor, the door hesitated and I held my breath until it groaned to a close.

This is the problem with home ownership. Not everything can be fixed with a good scrubbing and duct tape. Sometimes, an expert has to be called in to diagnose and fix what I cannot. So, in the end, it wasn’t cleaning that the garage door needed, it was a new opener. Enough said.

Hole in the Wall

There are times when living in a home leads to frustration and anger. I thought of all of that this week when I noticed a hole in the mortar surrounding the bricks. It was about the size of a quarter and about a foot from the ground. I imagined a mouse finding its way into my house or many more crawling animals having yet another entry into the house. I knew that I had to do something right away. To be clear, I had noticed this hole last fall, but the person who was going to tuck point that area, never showed up to do the job. Now, it  is spring and the hole, in my estimation, is even larger.

I took several pictures of the hole and went to Home Depot. I showed the Home Depot guy my pictures and asked if there was something that can be done short of tuckpointing. Amazingly enough, there  is something called Mortar Fix by Sikaflex. It cost less than $6 and you use it as you would caulk. Because I decided to give my ego a break and Home Depot guy offered, we went through step by step what I needed to do to complete the task. He showed me how to cut the tip off the Mortar Fix with the caulking gun and load the gun. He also said that I may have to cut the tip larger than what was possible with the caulking gun. After that help, I was good to go.

Let me be clear, this is not a blog about Home Depot, but I needed some serious help and their employee took the time and let me ask all the stupid questions I needed to ask. Plus, I had no intention of going back that day.

Back home, I cut the tip off with the caulking gun, but had to use a utility knife to get the tip the size I needed it to be. I loaded the gun and squeezed. Nothing happened. Then I read the directions. I failed to puncture the cannister at the base of the tip. Searching the garage, I found a skinny weapon to do the job and reloaded the mortar repair. This time I was in business. I went straight to the hole and filled it easily. I then noticed several more holes and began filling them also. All in all it was a successful and quick project. And I felt good about myself. Remember, I'm the person that took four days to change a recessed bulb. I wonder if there will ever be a time when I will feel less overwhelmed by the projects that come my way. But, I have learned that my best weapon is my camera. I have taken pictures of my next project and will be visiting a home improvement store soon to ask how I can complete it.

High Hopes!!!

In Kentucky, my grandparents had a crystal candy dish in their parlor filled with peppermints. I remember on one of my visits to Kentucky when, after eyeing the crystal candy dish, I asked if  I could have a piece of candy (pretty assured that the answer would be yes). But when I looked closely, I saw that ants had the same idea that I had. I passed on the candy and watched the ants in a single file climb into the dish for their dessert.  That was the only problem with ants I would ever see in my grandparent’s home.

Since I have moved into my own home, I have had continuing problems with ants. I don’t like using spray pesticides and because of that, I have used an assortment of ant baits. But the ants keep coming. I even paid for professional pest control for a full year. Unlike the other bugs, such as pill bugs or spiders that were kept at bay, the ants still seem to run the show. It doesn’t matter what time of year it is - spring, summer, winter, or fall - the ants still make their appearance in my kitchen or bathroom.

I’ll be honest with you; I’m at my wits end. No amount of cleaning or baiting has kept these insects away. I have set bait traps out only to see the ants go around them. I have tried “green” solutions and put baking soda on known ant trails (to keep ants away). It worked for about two days and then the ants came back. For another green solution, I put lemons slices around the sink to keep ants away. The ants just crawled either on or around them, but they kept coming. The only sure thing that makes the ants disappear is Mother Nature. If there is a heavy rainfall the ants suddenly disappear.

This year, I want to take back my kitchen. I don’t want to worry about walking into the kitchen on a sunny morning and finding hundreds of ants crawling over my cabinet (like last year). I realize that this is going to be more difficult than I first thought. I think that it will take a combination of sprays and baits on the inside and outside of the house. I bought Amdro as a barrier for the outside because I wanted to go with a pesticide designed to kill ants and not all bugs. I have a beautiful flower garden and I do not want to kill the bumble and honey bees who visit. (This is something that advertisements don’t tell you when they talk about killing ticks and fleas in your backyard. The same pesticide will kill beneficial insects.)

I went online and it seems that university extension sites and pest control sites all state the importance of knowing what kind of ant is invading your space. Unfortunately, when I was paying for pest control, no one mentioned the type of ant that was found in my house. But, I’m going out on a limb here and with out a microscope and a relative ignorance of insects, I think I have argentine ants. Quite frankly, I didn’t know there were so many kinds of ants and that they all act differently and have different foraging patterns. I’m going with the argentine ant because of their coloring and the foraging pattern seems to mesh with the ants in my home. 

Insects seem to have a way of getting what they need whether or not it is annoying to us. Ants eat what we eat or even what we throw away. I don't want to kill all ants (or even all bugs thought of as a nuisance), I just want my kitchen back.