Every Day Life: Project Eradicate Mystery Bugs

By Lara

I have mystery bugs in my apartment.

I first discovered them three weeks ago. I went to open a bag of flour, and there were three mystery bugs munching away on the glue holding the flour sack closed. I immediately exercised capitol punishment on the mystery bugs, and sifted through the bag of flour. No mystery bugs were found within the safety net provided by the thick paper sack. My flour was safe.

I cautiously looked through my cabinet and didn't see any more bugs. I didn't think too much more about the mystery bugs after that. I was hoping that it was an isolated incident of insect anomaly.

Let me describe these mystery bugs to you. They are small. Approximately the size of a long skinny baby ant. The smallest ones are black. As they get longer, they turn a reddish orange. The biggest ones are still rather small. They have a lot of little legs. I know what kinds of bugs they are NOT. I still have not identified them.

Last week I found more mystery bugs on my counter. It was time to declare war.

Friday night, armed with a can of bug spray, I opened my cabinet. I removed everything from the cabinet and inspected it for evidence of the mystery bug. Toby, my fearless gray tiger, was more than happy to assist. Once I declared my non-perishable food-stuffs bug free, I liberally sprayed all three shelves in my cabinet and shut the doors.

I went to sleep shortly thereafter feeling no guilt whatsoever about my chemical warfare attack and planned genocide of the mystery bug colony living in my cabinet. They were the invaders. It was a preemptive strike to hopefully subvert any attempts at full out kitchen invasion.

Saturday morning, I filled a bucket with Lysol and water and went down to dispose of the mystery bug carcasses. There were no carcasses on the top shelf... although I fell off the counter in my attempt to make absolutely sure. There were no bug carcasses on the second shelf. There were about 15 bug carcasses on the bottom shelf in the back corner. I have no idea what they found to munch on in the back corner of my pantry... unless they were eating the glue off my canned goods...

I lined the cabinet with vinyl sticky lining, and returned the food-stuffs to the shelves. There was only one casualty... A bag of Temptations Cat Treats was sacrificed in the night. Toby swears up and down that it was an enemy spy... fraternizing with the mystery bug menace. There were treat innards spread liberally over my kitchen and living room. Still. It could have been worse.

I found one more live bug on Saturday desperately clinging to a box of lasagna noodles. Let's just say that he was taken care of...

No bugs yesterday.

This morning I found a very sick looking mystery bug waving it's legs at me on my counter. Toby was alerted to his presence and snurfled him to death.

Here's hoping that he was a random straggler... a remnant of the original gassed colony and not a scout for the next wave.

Wow. That was a really long post about bugs. 

Epilogue:

Last night, I found another mystery bug. I squished it between some tape. Due to my overactive imagination, I gave it credit for having more legs than it actually has. Therefore, I believe that they are red flour beetles. It is my working mystery bug diagnosis.

Tomorrow I plan to buy seal-able canisters (rather than just my lovely decorative ones). I am going to put everything that is currently housed in either paper or cardboard in a canister or Ziplock bag. I am going to cut the labels off my canned goods and mark them with Sharpies. I will re-spray my cabinet and thoroughly clean my counter and floor. I am going to deal with this initial infestation as aggressively as possible.

I have also vowed to inspect my groceries more carefully before bringing them home. (Although I do realize that they were probably eggs when I brought them into my house.)

Sigh. I will conquer the beetle menace.

Lara works for the Department of Defense. She would tell you more, but then she'd have to hunt you down and, well, you know... She enjoys spending time with friends, building sand castles on the beach in winter and going on international adventures. Lara and Beth M. were the brains behind our fun series on the Year of the Birthday. We are thankful they have decided to continue the fun with the Bucket List and Every Day Life.