Deterring nuisance wildlife and cottage pests can take a lot of patience and persistence. But who has time for that? So, would these six moves of trickery work? Would they successfully outsmart or out-annoy cottage critters, or are they likely to fail? We asked the experts.
1. Ultrasonic sound generators
Goal To annoy cottage critters so much that they move out of your attic (or walls or shed or boathouse).
Likelihood of failure = High
At least according to every wildlife control expert that we’ve ever talked to. “It’ll drive dogs, cats, and people nuts,” says Mike Webb, the owner of West Coast Problem Wildlife Management on Vancouver Island. But in most cases, “wildlife won’t give a rip.”
It can work, but not always—it’s a myth that wasps will never build nests close to each other.
3. Owl decoy
Goal To frighten geese (or other waterfowl) from gathering on your dock.
Likelihood of failure = High
They’ll quickly figure out that there are no consequences to a bird of prey that does absolutely nothing except sway in the breeze.
4. Non-stop loud music
Goal To evict nuisance mammals.
Likelihood of failure = Medium
It’s worth trying—we’d move if, say, our neighbour played “Edamame” 24/7. But lots of denning mammals probably won’t.
5. Fake “attacking” predators that move up and down on a string
Goal To discourage woodpeckers from drumming on the cottage.
Likelihood of failure = Low
The Birds-Away Attack Spider and similar products get our experts’ stamp of approval. Birds aren’t arachnophobic, but “something that mimics a sit-and-wait predator would be more effective than any motionless decoy,” says Doug Tozer of Birds Canada.
6. Pet dog or cat
Goal To keep mice or other rodents from even considering moving in.
Likelihood of failure = Medium-Low
The very presence of a cat or dog can help deter mice (and hey, you’d get a pet out of the deal)! But a loose snake would probably work better.
Wasps have a reputation for being jerks because of their perceived aggressiveness and ability to sting repeatedly. They’re often negatively compared with the honey production and agricultural pollination of bees.
If wasps are jerks, however, they are positively saintly compared to their parasitic brethren.
Parasitic wasps sting to inject their eggs into a host, often accompanied by venom and a virus. Their larvae grow and eventually emerge from the unwitting host—usually killing it. Then they becoming adults and fly off to continue the cycle.
Some wasps go further, controlling their host’s behaviour, effectively “zombifying” them to help the larva survive. After studying the behaviour of ichneumon wasps, which lay their eggs in moth larvae, naturalist Charles Darwin wrote that they were so evil that they were proof against the idea that God was directing evolution:
While no wasps are known to lay eggs in humans (although some flies do), they have inspired films like the Alien franchise and the recently released monster survival video game House of Ashes.
Ridley Scott’s 1979 movie ‘Alien’ centred on a parasitic alien species.
But whether inspiring horror or metaphysical questions, parasitic wasps also save millions of human lives.
The samurai wasp (Trissolcus japonicus) was being studied for potential use against the brown marmorated stinkbug, a threat to many crops across the continental United States. However, the wasp preempted this, moving into stinkbug territories on its own.
Biocontrol has several advantages over pesticides. Populations can grow and spread on their own, as demonstrated by the samurai wasps, whereas pesticides typically need humans to spread them. Organisms can maintain their presence over the long-term without human intervention, while pesticides often require repeat applications. Pests can also evolve to resist pesticides in as few as 20 generations. And as biocontrol uses another organism, they can evolve in response the pest’s defences.
For example, the cane toad was introduced in Australia to eat several insect pests there. Instead, the poisonous toad became a lethal meal for several native species, disrupting many other parts of the ecosystems there.
A laughing kookaburra eats a cane toad. Some kookaburras die from ingesting the poisonous toads. (Photo by Chris Ison/Shutterstock)
So next time you’re online and see wasps being unfairly maligned, consider the millions of humans across the world who are alive and able to feed themselves because of them. And maybe this upcoming Halloween, should you encounter the spirit of a certain 1800s English naturalist going on about the theological implications of parasitic wasps’ evil, tell him of the good they can do.
