Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2020/03/10/772311.html
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I have so many questions
The first is: is a trap sufficient to capture enough of the pests to make it worth doing? I mean, a skunk trap gets you one skunk, and if all you have is one skunk, you’re in good shape. But even if you captured 80% of the worms or whatever, aren’t the untrapped ones simply going to reproduce to make up for the shortfall?
And the second is: Why is this a video? Why are so many urgently and productively useful facts now in long videos instead of short, scannable, searchable blog posts?
I kept waiting for the helpful narrator to arrive and show us something complicated that can only be seen in motion…
Alas.
The problem with being on this internet thing for so long is that we remember when it was better.
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I was just going to wistfully post how nice it would be if YouTube was filled with videos like this instead of, well, what it’s actually filled with.
As to efficacy, IAmNotAnEntomologist, but often mitigation is your only real option, especially if you are organic certified. Also, mitigation like this can dramatically reduce your pesticide requirements, if you are going that route.
Also, “Scentry Biologicals”, hyuk, hyuk.
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I completely agree on video vs. text. I will never click through to the 'Tube
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I think it depends on a number of factors including the scale of the problem and the space involved. I used some smaller-scale pheromone traps to deal with a minor infestation of codling moths in a backyard garden, and it actually made the problem worse, apparently by attracting moths from outside the immediate area into the garden more than it trapped them…
Yeah, I was just wondering that while looking for some information on something just last night, hoping for a couple pages of text, but only finding videos… but it’s especially galling when the video is entirely composed of text and still images. I suspect that’s the result of someone who has had to give (or sit in on) too many powerpoint presentations…
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Whenever I think of pheremones I always think of the Bloodhound Gang from 3-2-1-Contact and the episode where they used moths to simulate an apparition. Which I know know was titled The Case of the Cackling Ghost
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Almost certainly because we’re still seeing the echo of Facebook’s puffed-up “videos drive more engagement” stats.
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I used to work at Garden Centers and when people bought wasp, beetle, or what not, traps I would always recommend they put it in a neighbors yard, preferably one they didn’t like, due to the issue of attraction and the related undesired results.
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I’ve had quite different results with yellow jacket traps, on the other hand - they were quite successful in reducing yellow jacket numbers. I haven’t used those traps in a while and the problem went away almost entirely… wait a minute…
Pests seem to be able to manage themselves just fine.
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