Sunday, February 20, 2011

Bugs & Alfresco Dining

When designing our new home our must have item were 2 walls of timber bi-fold doors meeting at the middle, opening onto our alfresco area.

And this was the display home where we first fell in love with them. Swoon.



Only problem with this kind of opening is that it's difficult to keep the insects out and I don't know about you but I'm really not a fan of bugs inside!

We're having a ceiling fan in the alfresco which I've heard helps to keep the bugs at bay.  We've also looked into screening options that can be retro-fitted.  There are a couple of options such as fly-screen roller blinds that have magnets and attach in the middle but I'm not convinced they'd stand the test of children time - especially with such a wide distance to cover and nothing more supportive in the middle to attach to.  Anyway, kinda defeats the purpose of having the beautiful opening only to put a screen in the way!

Then when I was at a friend's party a few months ago, we got chatting about her bug "killer" which had managed to keep all the bugs out of the house even though her sliding doors had been open all night.  I was quite excited about this little find as it's not a traditional zap it & smoke it kinda bug zapper (nothing like a smoking fried bug to kill the mood), it kills them quietly & smell free instead! Hey, they're only bugs! 

My friend had a bugvac which I can only seem to find at a Perth Mitre 10 store but I've also found the Bug Eater which is Australian made and appears to work in exactly the same way.

How it works (as quoted from their site)...

Insects are lured to the bugeater by an 8 watt ultra-violet light, specially formulated to attract biting insects.  As the insects approach the light, they are blown into the water tray below the fan.  A couple of drops of liquid detergent is added to the tray of the mosquito trap, to break the surface tension of the water, the insect is unable to float on the water so it drowns.

So it's safe (no chemicals), quiet, Australian made and effective.  I'll take 2 thanks!






How have you overcome a similar problem?



5 comments:

Anonymous said...

We have the sliding door at the back of our house open all the time as the kids are in and out and to be honest we haven't really had that big a problem with bugs so far. Sometimes the flies get in but we just whack them with the fly sway and sometimes we have mozzies get in our bedrooms over night if we've has doors open in the day. I think at night it's more an issue because of their attraction to the light but during the day it's not as big a deal. I've learnt to not care too much about it any more as well.

Karla said...

Hey V, great to know that they're less a problem than I'm thinking they'll be.

Cass said...

Love your bug catcher idea.. will look at that for us too!!!!

Unknown said...

What a great idea, must check this out. Was wondering how I'd get past this problem too! Also saw the flyscreen rollers on the Corinthian website, but not sure how good they are.

Karla said...

This at least will be a cheaper alternative :)

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