Frequently Asked Question: What do we do about bugs?

Thanks to the weather here in Southern California, we live a very fluid indoor/outdoor lifestyle year-round. Our windows and doors are almost always thrown open wide, welcoming in the ocean air, the occasional hummingbird, and, inevitably, some bugs. 

Not a day goes by that someone doesn’t message me to ask what we do about critters making their way into the Cottage, or finding their way down from the vine canopy. So I thought it was time to post about what we do (and don’t do) to manage our tiniest housemates. 

First, keep in mind that bugs in Los Angeles are nothing compared to bugs in many (probably most) other places. I’m from Florida, and we could never leave our home open there unless we wanted to be swarmed by mosquitos and joined by snakes (and perhaps an alligator or two) while going about our business indoors. Screens and overhead fans are borderline necessities in my childhood home, whereas here at the Cottage we have neither.

At the end of the day, it’s not my goal to rid our home of any living thing beyond our family of 5 and our plants. I feel like it’s all a natural balance, and that if we have healthy soil and thriving greenery we’ll have more pollinators and bugs. (And other than the damned mosquitoes, that’s quite all right by me.) Here’s how we handle it.

MOSQUITOES
Since we’re located by the canals, we sometimes get mosquitos. During the drought, there were few to none. But in the (blessedly) wetter years, we get mosquitoes from roughly April through November. (As we had a particularly wet March, the little rudelings already here for 2020.)

To keep them off of us at night, we use a box fan that we point at the bed. This is nice anyways, as we don’t have (or want) AC. When in the garden during sunset when they’re most active, we’ll wear long linen clothing and burn these non-toxic, bee safe mosquito repellent sticks, which we simply stake into the pea gravel. The smell doesn’t bother me the way citronella sometimes does, and the sticks burn smoothly. 

For a bit of extra coverage if we’re hosting or if we’re in the thickest part of summer, we’ll sometimes add a citronella hanging coil, and/or a traditional multi-wick candle. We also have a smattering of Aunt Fannie’s Mosquito products— West is particularly fond of this tin of “balm-balm,” as he calls it.

SPIDERS
I know spiders give a lot of folks the shivers, but they simply don’t bother us. In fact, since they helps us keep other bugs at bay, we appreciate them. If we find one in a corner of the shower or up on the ceiling bends, we just help them outside via a jar. No biggie.

When it comes to the vines, we sometimes see webs, but rarely are they occupied. They’ve never repelled down onto us. However, we tread slowly through the garden during the early morning hours, as more than a few set up camp overnight and need a some extra seconds to raise up out of the pathway back into their secret hiding spots.

HUMMINGBIRDS & BUTTERFLIES
Winged beauties will sometimes fly into our home and try to escape through the skylights (which, sadly, don’t open). With a bit of patience, we’re always able to get them to land on a potted plant that we then carefully carry back outside.

MISC BUGS
We almost never see other bugs in the house. (Again, it’s LA— I know that’s not typical of other environments.)  But if we get sugar ants or or fruit-flies (which sometimes happens in July/August), we use non-toxic fruit fly punch and simple soap-and-water solutions to curb the onslaught.