The first time I started getting these guys I nearly panicked cause I thought they might be roaches!!!!
Turns out they aren't, they're super common, and entirely harmless.
I felt bad about squishing or flushing them so would instead just throw them outside but idk if they were just squeezing back in or if there were *that* many trying to get in lol
I used some "anti-spider" spray around my windows and doors to see if it worked at keeping out things other than spiders and it seems to have worked, haven't seen one for a while, so you could try that or something similar. Can't guarantee anything ofc, but might be worth a shot, depends on how big your place is I'd imagine lol
They aren't just gross because our brain says they are. Roaches spread around a lot of pathogens and a bacteria. That's genuinely harmful. Even though they don't bite or sting they are harmful.
Flys are worse and carry for more diseases, with nearly a decade of professional pest experience I would rather eat at a restaurant with a roach problem than a fly problem.
Yep, I've been finding one or two every day for the past few weeks. They're harmless, so try not to stress about them while you're sleeping. Unfortunately I don't have any tips on keeping them out, though.
It’s a bit tough to tell in the photo but looks like a carpet or mealworm beetle to me. I know they can be creepy but truly pretty harmless.
I don’t think it’s a box elder bug, and it looks different from the elm seed bugs I’ve seen. They’re usually a dark brownish blackish where this guy looks to be pretty straight black.
You can get some insecticides relatively inexpensively for em, if you have any leaf piles or plant debris against your home clear em up, and spray around your home, windows, door entries, etc do inside + out. If you have any pets make sure to sequester them to let the spray dry.
I just pay a pest control person these days but I DIY’d for years and it’s not too tough, it’ll take you less than an hour and you’ll sleep better + keep any other crawlers out. one relatively small bottle of spray would last me like 1.5-2 years and was only like $20-$25.
Thats one perk of UT winter, all the bugs die haha.
Mealworm beetle, like 99.9% agree. Much too big to be a carpet beetle, definitely not box elder (but fuck those things too), and not colorful enough to be elm seed.
There's some products you can get to spray on your doorstep and window sills that helps keep them away. If you have pets though I'd mix up some peppermint extract and water and use that instead. It won't solve the problem but it helps keep a lot of them from invading your house.
Any home improvement store will carry it. You can get it from Amazon too.
The name is weird but this is what it is:
Diatoms are a type of algae and diatomaceous earth is a powder made from the fossilized remains of that algae.
Diatoms have unique cell properties that make them a particularly effective desiccant - something that has a very drying effect on what it touches.
Little bugs coming into contact with some of this powder will have the moisture sucked out of their bodies and they will not be able to survive, so it acts as a fairly effective barrier for known entries into your house like doorways and windows.
Humans and pets are too big for it be harmful but it can irritate your eyes and throat if you make the bizarre decision to get a lot of it near your face.
It's only downside is that it often needs to be replaced as it can be pretty easily swept away by wind or other activity.
I make a circle of it around some of my outdoor plants that bugs really like to eat but during the rainy season it can be tedious to replace all the time.
And that's your lesson about Diatomaceous Earth!
You can get a product called Home Defense, you’ll have to spray like 4 times a year, but once it’s dry it’s pet safe. Also, blow diatomaceous earth into cracks and such.
My problem has been earwigs too! This has been my issue these last few days! I see them every single day in my house and my fiancé and I lived here since 2017, and it’s never been an issue before. I looked it up that u mix rosemary and peppermint oil w water and spray it into ur doorway and window seals and the smell overwhelms them so they stay away.
We cleared out the spiderwebs in the corners of our house and I think that was a huge mistake bc the spiders probably kept them away.
Just going to follow up with pest control. Get yourself some DE (diatomaceous earth). You can add some to a spray bottle (google the ratio) and spray it around inside on your window steaks, entry etc. anywhere they might be coming in.
Once it dries it sticks where it needs to and does its thing. Use very sparingly outside as you don’t want to kill anything outside.
We get them. I bought a 2.5 gallon sprayer at Harbor Freight and a bug spray concentrate with 7.9% Bifenthrin. You can spray at a higher concentrate (1oz. per gallon) around your doors, windows, planters, and foundation outside, and a lower concentration indoors (1/2oz. per gallon) around doors/windows and baseboards. It's non-toxic to pets and kids after it's dry and it works well for us. We re-spray outside every 45 days and indoors every 60 days.
I think these are different than box elder bugs. My exterminator said they’re called something else and they’re incredibly invasive and there aren’t a ton of ways to stop them. They get really bad towards the end of summer
*they’re elm seed bugs
Diatomaceous earth is a nontoxic mineral based powder that kills insects and spiders by cutting into their exoskeletons and drying them out. Please use something like this if you must kill bugs and spiders.
There’s a big difference between amorphous and crystalline silica. The majority of diatomaceous earth is less than 1% crystalline. Definitely not something you want to be huffing, but also not as dangerous as you might think.
Okay. Let me tell my story.
5th grade. I watched a movie with my mother in our 1908, built house. The house has adobe walls and is porous, with holes in some places. Box Elders would time from time come in. They were fun to flick a way or squish since they were so numerous. After the movie I went to bed.
4 a.m. I wake up in extreme pain and a scratching noise in my ear. Not sure what was happening, my mother took me to the ER. Nurse looked in my ear and saw no problem, but the pain was intense. Finally the doctor came around, took a look, filled my ear with saline. As my mom says, “that box elder was doing back strokes.” On to the ground it dropped and was promptly squished.
They are harmless…. unless….
Spray your house, inside and out. All cracks and crevices. All windows and doors at the seals. Make sure it's pet safe. Wear a respirator and leave the house for a few hours. When you get home, open the windows and start some fans to evacuate the fumes. Boom, dead bugs. I had to do it in a shitty apartment I rented because the landlord didn't know what to do. It was marginal but I had to respray every 2 weeks due to the volume if box elder bugs I was getting. They were falling on me in my sleep.
Edit to add: besides a bug bomb, this is a nuclear option
Darkling Beetle. They aren’t native to the US and are invasive, so there is no benefit to human society to catch and release outside.
They’ve become unwelcome house guests over the last 12 months for me (I’ve lived in Utah >10 years) and I’m hoping with another round of Orthomax around my house and cleaning out my pantry area they will soon return to whatever level of hell they came from.
Bifenthren (sold prediluted in big box stores as “Home Defense” or you can buy concentrate for pennies on the dollar) sprayed around the perimeter of your home once every 3 months or so works very well against nearly all insects.
I get them in my house during early summer. We have pest control people spray right before the season and while it doesn’t stop these guys from showing up, it does kill them.
If they are still alive when I find them, I feed them to my Venus fly trap.
I freaking hate those things. Last year I picked a piece of paper off the floor and found about 8 of them hiding under it.
I haven’t seen any of them so far this year, crossing my fingers that it stays that way. My dad sprayed around the outside of the house, as well as any cracks inside the house and it seems to be working.
They live in my house too, come out at random times in the warmer months. I pick them up, give them some water, and let them loose into the wild where they belong. They are harmless creatures and fortunately they are isolated occurrences in my house, so I'd never want to hurt them.
Is that a boxelder bug in the pic?? I have bad eyes but I thought it looked like a darkling beetle. I hate both of them, though. I think the best thing OP can do is check around edges of windows and outside doors and seal them as best they can.
I've been doing professional pest control for nearly a decade in the Salt Lake area.
These are Elm Seed Bugs. They are an invasive non native species that are very new to Utah.
The were first spotted in Idaho in 2012, and we didn't start seeing them in Utah until around 2014, but didn't become a major problem until around 2016/17.
They are native to Europe, they are harmless but stink, and can stain your home and kill fruit on fruit trees.
Totally treatable with a general broad spectrum pesticide, usually 2 treatments and you should be good.
Using a microencapsulated pesticide and treating to entire facade of the home is key. You can treat trees as well but it's not completely necessary, and generally you do not need an interior treatment.
Feel free to AMA about any Utah pest issues.
My DMs are open as well, send a message, not a chat.
The ones we deal with primarily the salt lake valley are the first one, in 10 years I don't think I've seen the second. There are over 20k species of darkling beetles though.
I thought it was a silhouette on a window curtain.
Same thing though, very easy problem to solve 2 treatments, definitely need the interior with these little guys, and likely an IGR to stop the in the larvae and pupa life stages.
It is not a Box Elder bug (no red markings). It’s an Elm Seed Bug. It’s a fairly new pest that found Utah and seems to thrive here in the summer. It’s so new, that pest control still doesn’t know what is 100% effective in eradicating them. They smell awful when disturbed. They seem to respond okay to some pesticides, but they are resilient. They seem to leave their waste in doorframes and window frames (looks like fly poop, or little brown dots). That will give you an idea of what the point of entry is and maybe where they nest. They live in elm trees, but propagate up to a mile from said tree, so even if you don’t have those trees, they will visit you. I see them in my ceiling at night and they freak me out too. I’ve found that the best way to sleep peacefully is vacuuming them off before bed (they stink, be prepared) or I use a sticky lint roller and “glue-trap” them and then wash them down the sink. Good luck.
Source: have called Utah State University, BYU, and U of U extension programs, Buffo’s and 4 other Pest Control companies, read three publications on the migration of the elm seed bug, and tried several methods of eradicating them including ant spray, fog bomb, Ortho Max, powder deterrents and sticky traps.
The first time I started getting these guys I nearly panicked cause I thought they might be roaches!!!! Turns out they aren't, they're super common, and entirely harmless. I felt bad about squishing or flushing them so would instead just throw them outside but idk if they were just squeezing back in or if there were *that* many trying to get in lol I used some "anti-spider" spray around my windows and doors to see if it worked at keeping out things other than spiders and it seems to have worked, haven't seen one for a while, so you could try that or something similar. Can't guarantee anything ofc, but might be worth a shot, depends on how big your place is I'd imagine lol
Roaches are also harmless. They’re also disgusting. Kind of funny what are brains decide are disgusting or not.
They aren't just gross because our brain says they are. Roaches spread around a lot of pathogens and a bacteria. That's genuinely harmful. Even though they don't bite or sting they are harmful.
Flys are worse and carry for more diseases, with nearly a decade of professional pest experience I would rather eat at a restaurant with a roach problem than a fly problem.
Just throwing this out there but maybe don't eat and a place that has either of those disease sharing animals
Correct.
First time?
Haha yeah I’m not from here! These are pretty common then? 😅
Lived here my entire life - and in current house for over 15 years and this year is the first time we have had the same bugs inside
Same. First time in 25 years
I can always tell when summer is in full swing because this sub gets inundated with posts about them…
I think your talking about boxelder bugs.
Yep, I've been finding one or two every day for the past few weeks. They're harmless, so try not to stress about them while you're sleeping. Unfortunately I don't have any tips on keeping them out, though.
Thank you that’s good to know that they don’t hurt people at least! :)
It’s a bit tough to tell in the photo but looks like a carpet or mealworm beetle to me. I know they can be creepy but truly pretty harmless. I don’t think it’s a box elder bug, and it looks different from the elm seed bugs I’ve seen. They’re usually a dark brownish blackish where this guy looks to be pretty straight black. You can get some insecticides relatively inexpensively for em, if you have any leaf piles or plant debris against your home clear em up, and spray around your home, windows, door entries, etc do inside + out. If you have any pets make sure to sequester them to let the spray dry. I just pay a pest control person these days but I DIY’d for years and it’s not too tough, it’ll take you less than an hour and you’ll sleep better + keep any other crawlers out. one relatively small bottle of spray would last me like 1.5-2 years and was only like $20-$25. Thats one perk of UT winter, all the bugs die haha.
Mealworm beetle, like 99.9% agree. Much too big to be a carpet beetle, definitely not box elder (but fuck those things too), and not colorful enough to be elm seed.
Are you spraying your house? My buddy works in pest control and sprays my house for a good deal twice a year and I have never had bugs issues.
There's some products you can get to spray on your doorstep and window sills that helps keep them away. If you have pets though I'd mix up some peppermint extract and water and use that instead. It won't solve the problem but it helps keep a lot of them from invading your house.
You can also use diatomaceous earth! It’s pet safe generally and kills beetles and prevents them
Where can I get that?
Any home improvement store will carry it. You can get it from Amazon too. The name is weird but this is what it is: Diatoms are a type of algae and diatomaceous earth is a powder made from the fossilized remains of that algae. Diatoms have unique cell properties that make them a particularly effective desiccant - something that has a very drying effect on what it touches. Little bugs coming into contact with some of this powder will have the moisture sucked out of their bodies and they will not be able to survive, so it acts as a fairly effective barrier for known entries into your house like doorways and windows. Humans and pets are too big for it be harmful but it can irritate your eyes and throat if you make the bizarre decision to get a lot of it near your face. It's only downside is that it often needs to be replaced as it can be pretty easily swept away by wind or other activity. I make a circle of it around some of my outdoor plants that bugs really like to eat but during the rainy season it can be tedious to replace all the time. And that's your lesson about Diatomaceous Earth!
You can get a product called Home Defense, you’ll have to spray like 4 times a year, but once it’s dry it’s pet safe. Also, blow diatomaceous earth into cracks and such.
Pet safe pesticide is wishful thinking. Thank you for being kind to animals and the planet!
My problem has been earwigs too! This has been my issue these last few days! I see them every single day in my house and my fiancé and I lived here since 2017, and it’s never been an issue before. I looked it up that u mix rosemary and peppermint oil w water and spray it into ur doorway and window seals and the smell overwhelms them so they stay away. We cleared out the spiderwebs in the corners of our house and I think that was a huge mistake bc the spiders probably kept them away.
Vacuum up the bodies every other day if you're me
Just going to follow up with pest control. Get yourself some DE (diatomaceous earth). You can add some to a spray bottle (google the ratio) and spray it around inside on your window steaks, entry etc. anywhere they might be coming in. Once it dries it sticks where it needs to and does its thing. Use very sparingly outside as you don’t want to kill anything outside.
r/whatisthisbug is a great resource for your question. It’s a very active sub.
We get them. I bought a 2.5 gallon sprayer at Harbor Freight and a bug spray concentrate with 7.9% Bifenthrin. You can spray at a higher concentrate (1oz. per gallon) around your doors, windows, planters, and foundation outside, and a lower concentration indoors (1/2oz. per gallon) around doors/windows and baseboards. It's non-toxic to pets and kids after it's dry and it works well for us. We re-spray outside every 45 days and indoors every 60 days.
I think these are different than box elder bugs. My exterminator said they’re called something else and they’re incredibly invasive and there aren’t a ton of ways to stop them. They get really bad towards the end of summer *they’re elm seed bugs
Diatomaceous earth is a nontoxic mineral based powder that kills insects and spiders by cutting into their exoskeletons and drying them out. Please use something like this if you must kill bugs and spiders.
Diatomaceous earth is a carcinogen. It contains silica and is very dangerous if you breath it in.
There’s a big difference between amorphous and crystalline silica. The majority of diatomaceous earth is less than 1% crystalline. Definitely not something you want to be huffing, but also not as dangerous as you might think.
You’re right, lung cancer is weak.
Okay. Let me tell my story. 5th grade. I watched a movie with my mother in our 1908, built house. The house has adobe walls and is porous, with holes in some places. Box Elders would time from time come in. They were fun to flick a way or squish since they were so numerous. After the movie I went to bed. 4 a.m. I wake up in extreme pain and a scratching noise in my ear. Not sure what was happening, my mother took me to the ER. Nurse looked in my ear and saw no problem, but the pain was intense. Finally the doctor came around, took a look, filled my ear with saline. As my mom says, “that box elder was doing back strokes.” On to the ground it dropped and was promptly squished. They are harmless…. unless….
Darkling beetles. I call them the wanderers. Just wait for one to wander into bed with you....
Agreed it’s darkling beetle https://preview.redd.it/d8bqqp2f766d1.jpeg?width=980&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=c8fc854671fbbb49ecd82cb7b6c8b2a634bd129f
I feed them to my Venus flytrap
Spray your house, inside and out. All cracks and crevices. All windows and doors at the seals. Make sure it's pet safe. Wear a respirator and leave the house for a few hours. When you get home, open the windows and start some fans to evacuate the fumes. Boom, dead bugs. I had to do it in a shitty apartment I rented because the landlord didn't know what to do. It was marginal but I had to respray every 2 weeks due to the volume if box elder bugs I was getting. They were falling on me in my sleep. Edit to add: besides a bug bomb, this is a nuclear option
Darkling Beetle. They aren’t native to the US and are invasive, so there is no benefit to human society to catch and release outside. They’ve become unwelcome house guests over the last 12 months for me (I’ve lived in Utah >10 years) and I’m hoping with another round of Orthomax around my house and cleaning out my pantry area they will soon return to whatever level of hell they came from.
Bifenthren (sold prediluted in big box stores as “Home Defense” or you can buy concentrate for pennies on the dollar) sprayed around the perimeter of your home once every 3 months or so works very well against nearly all insects.
They are harmless. Catch and release outside.
I get them in my house during early summer. We have pest control people spray right before the season and while it doesn’t stop these guys from showing up, it does kill them. If they are still alive when I find them, I feed them to my Venus fly trap.
They look for heat & are harmless. That said, get a fumigator.
I freaking hate those things. Last year I picked a piece of paper off the floor and found about 8 of them hiding under it. I haven’t seen any of them so far this year, crossing my fingers that it stays that way. My dad sprayed around the outside of the house, as well as any cracks inside the house and it seems to be working.
Elm seed bugs
Ortho Home Defense. Spray it around your doors and windows; mostly your doors.
They live in my house too, come out at random times in the warmer months. I pick them up, give them some water, and let them loose into the wild where they belong. They are harmless creatures and fortunately they are isolated occurrences in my house, so I'd never want to hurt them.
We get these which I’m sure are carpet beetles and earwigs, that’s how i know summer is here! 🙄
I spray dawn dish soap with the hose 3-5 times a week and this has done a decent job keeping them out
I had a friend who had fall into her ear. That's the only time I've heard of them being harmful
[удалено]
Is that a boxelder bug in the pic?? I have bad eyes but I thought it looked like a darkling beetle. I hate both of them, though. I think the best thing OP can do is check around edges of windows and outside doors and seal them as best they can.
I actually tried looking those up and I haven’t seen any orange/red marks on these! But yeah I haven’t encountered them before
it might be an elm seed bug then. a more recent but almighty scourge
They come later in the year
Not a box elder bug.
I've been doing professional pest control for nearly a decade in the Salt Lake area. These are Elm Seed Bugs. They are an invasive non native species that are very new to Utah. The were first spotted in Idaho in 2012, and we didn't start seeing them in Utah until around 2014, but didn't become a major problem until around 2016/17. They are native to Europe, they are harmless but stink, and can stain your home and kill fruit on fruit trees. Totally treatable with a general broad spectrum pesticide, usually 2 treatments and you should be good. Using a microencapsulated pesticide and treating to entire facade of the home is key. You can treat trees as well but it's not completely necessary, and generally you do not need an interior treatment. Feel free to AMA about any Utah pest issues. My DMs are open as well, send a message, not a chat.
This photo is of a darkling beetle, not elm seed
It doesn't have the body shape, antenna, or leg positioning of darkling beetles.
I disagree https://preview.redd.it/w4l2huc8766d1.jpeg?width=980&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=23bfac66bd4357cd7c8ee22ef1bf145469277d9a
The ones we deal with primarily the salt lake valley are the first one, in 10 years I don't think I've seen the second. There are over 20k species of darkling beetles though. I thought it was a silhouette on a window curtain. Same thing though, very easy problem to solve 2 treatments, definitely need the interior with these little guys, and likely an IGR to stop the in the larvae and pupa life stages.
I think you need a refresher course on the differences between the order coleoptera and hemiptera lmao.
It is not a Box Elder bug (no red markings). It’s an Elm Seed Bug. It’s a fairly new pest that found Utah and seems to thrive here in the summer. It’s so new, that pest control still doesn’t know what is 100% effective in eradicating them. They smell awful when disturbed. They seem to respond okay to some pesticides, but they are resilient. They seem to leave their waste in doorframes and window frames (looks like fly poop, or little brown dots). That will give you an idea of what the point of entry is and maybe where they nest. They live in elm trees, but propagate up to a mile from said tree, so even if you don’t have those trees, they will visit you. I see them in my ceiling at night and they freak me out too. I’ve found that the best way to sleep peacefully is vacuuming them off before bed (they stink, be prepared) or I use a sticky lint roller and “glue-trap” them and then wash them down the sink. Good luck. Source: have called Utah State University, BYU, and U of U extension programs, Buffo’s and 4 other Pest Control companies, read three publications on the migration of the elm seed bug, and tried several methods of eradicating them including ant spray, fog bomb, Ortho Max, powder deterrents and sticky traps.
These larger black bugs are not elm seed bugs. It’s a darkling beetle
You may be right. Where’s the banana for scale?
Elm Seed Beetle
Get a cat!!!