As my family was sitting down to dinner in our backyard recently, one family member let out a yelp.
As they pulled up one of the lawn chairs, they noticed a couple of earwigs crawling out of the seam between the back and bottom cushion. 鈥淵uck, there鈥檚 an earwig nest in here!鈥�
Someone else then found a couple of the pesky pincer bugs in the same place on another chair. No nests, but the chairs were quickly replaced with cushion-less seating.
I also received a recent earwig surprise. When I picked up a dish of catfood that had been left on the back porch overnight, a well-fed gang of the creepy critters erupted from the middle of the kibbles.
鈥楥reepy鈥� mainly because of their six slender legs, two antenna and two sturdy pincers, I guess. Although they apparently don鈥檛 bite people or badly damage plants. Or inhabit ears, despite the name.
When a friend who had been staying on Shuswap Lake came into town to visit the other day, she also had an earwig tale.
Every year she puts up her tent under a tree near her relatives鈥� cabin. Not this year. Someone else had stayed there a couple of nights earlier, and awoke to find a group of six-legged roommates inside their tent.
And these weren鈥檛 the only instances this year of an abundance of earwigs.
At Nico鈥檚 Nurseryland, manager Maaike Johnson says it鈥檚 been an earwig year.
鈥淭hey鈥檝e definitely increased. A lot of people are asking how to get rid of them.鈥�
She recommends Diatomaceous earth, which she says is a good natural product.
鈥淚t seems like every year there鈥檚 something. Last year it would have been ants, this year it鈥檚 been earwigs,鈥� she says.
Read more:
Read more:
Read more:
Looking for more observations, I called city hall. Although public works hasn鈥檛 noticed an increase, a quick chat with Stephanie Gibb at reception revealed she鈥檚 definitely seen an influx. Her outside plants in pots with holes in the bottom will sometimes have 50 earwigs under them, she says.
鈥淚鈥檓 just blown away.鈥�
No bug specialists were available to explain why so many. But the all-knowing Internet shed a little light.
Earwigs like dark, moist environments with access to a food source. They need to stay someplace moist so they don鈥檛 dry out. It鈥檚 likely then that all of the rain earlier this summer provided them with just what they need.
If the Internet sources are right, and it鈥檚 the additional rain that has attracted so many, I think I鈥檒l gladly share the earth with them. When it comes to forest fires versus earwigs, the little creepies are the clear winner.
marthawickett@saobserver.net
Like us on and follow us on
