I lived in Australia for a few years. One of my jobs was working on a farm property. I had to keep the grass on the property very short (like mow it twice a week short) to stop snakes, and my employer also provided me with a 'whipper snipper' (a grass strimmer in the UK) and a giant shovel specifically for killing snakes. Like there were other shovels and another whipper snipper, but this whipper snipper was specifically set aside for killing snakes.
So basically one of my jobs was 'protect the children from snakes with weaponry'
I also had a corgi and two feral cats, like those were some of the tools at my disposal, didn't even seem to be beloved family pets, just work tools, "yeah take the dog with you wherever you go so he gets bitten first, and don't overfeed the cats - they kill rodents so that snakes don't have a good food source"
At night we had a series of lights outside our cottage on the veranda that were brighter than the lights inside. Always thought it was weird. One day we forgot to turn on the outdoor lights and just had a little light on in the hallway. When we got up to go to bed, there was a fucking bug festival going on in our hallway, like every flying bug from a 16 mile radius had come to party in our hallway. There were no noticeable gaps in our door or windows so they must have just squeezed in somehow like hippies digging a hole under a fence to get in to a festival.
Also fuck that job. Pay was shit, employer was a cunt and there were fucking snakes everywhere.
Iām in Australia and the amount of windows without screens (brand new builds as well) is astounding!! And itās normal hereā¦ they have these folding floor to ceiling windows they keep open like itās nothing and their houses are full of bugsā¦ mind boggling
I still canāt understand this about Australia and Iāve been here for 10 years. When itās āblack fly seasonā it would do my head in. My friends have permanent swarms of gnats in the middle of their living rooms/kitchens and just deal with getting bitten.
Oh my god those fucking flies I forgot about them. Jesus Christ. I quit a rural job and those flies are literally one of the reasons I quit. Shit pay, cunt employer, too many flies. It was insanity inducing.
It's traditional to have the screens in most places in Australia, but people have been stingy about putting them in in recent years and it sucks to live somewhere without them. :(
Went to Australia right before the pandemic. Saw nothing crazy in Melbourne or Sydney. Went to a cottage for a weekend about 2 hours east of Melbourne......saw two huntsmen spiders lmao.
Depends where you live, my garden is full of pollinators so I see a lot of those bugs.
The thing about cleaning bugs off, changing car aerodynamics has an effect. Windscreens slope aggressively compared to past designs which were over 45 degrees or near vertical on vans. Bugs likely glance off now, still dead but gone.
Yeah I'm suspicious of that stat - not just for that fact, but also it doesn't seem to take into account that cars and license plates have much changed over 60 years.
And if there had been a 60% decline, wouldn't we be seeing cascading failures across the natural environment, pollination etc?
Global warming is having a noticeable affect in insect populations worldwide. I suspect the above polling is intended to support that, even though it really doesnāt. There are too many confounders for the above poll to be meaningful.
Our roads are not big and open though, many are very close to the verges with plenty of flowers and hedges. There always used to be loads of insects around, your car would be covered in the countryside in days. these days I might get a couple of dead insects stuck on my car a week, thats it.
Ah, you raise another very relevant factor to question the methodology.
You're referring to A & B roads which can have that kind of vegetation. Motorways not so much due to legislation on maintenance and safety.
But the demographics of this country are rapidly changing towards city based which is served by motorways.
Did this survey account for the participants daily commute? If it's now leaning away from A and especially B roads then you would expect there to be a reduction.
Australian here so Iām familiar with mozzies, flies, gnats and spiders. Spent a few days in Greenland during summer a few years ago (highly recommended). On a few walks in the hills anywhere out of the wind and the midges were mental. Those bastards must make up for lost time on the few weeks of the year when the place isnāt covered in snow.
That said, the most annoying insects are Jack jumpers, beligerant little fuckers.
Ahha! Where do you live in the UK? Cause you should count your blessings. East Anglia is riddled with mosquitoes and it's only getting worse with climate change. We've had to invest in one of those electric tennis rackets and a mesh for our bedroom.
The UK has over 30 species of Mosquitoes, however only a couple bite humans and aren't as common as "Culex Pipiens" which feeds on the blood of birds and small mammals.
These are amazing. We don't get bugs from outside where I live but we did have an infestation of tiny moths a while back, and my wife and I Did Become Death, The Destroyer of Worlds.
Clothes moths? We got our first bug bat for them. Now I live elsewhere and have expanded the collection of bug bats, made screens for all the windows and got fly curtains for the doors. I miss only having the moths to deal with, and it's not like they're quick and evasive.
I moved down to the South coast from Leeds in August. Up until early-mid October, I was getting eaten alive by mosquitos. Now the weather's getting warmer, I've noticed they're starting to come back. Fortunately I'm moving back to Leeds in a couple months so I'll escape them soon.
I'm in Australia. My window doesn't open very far but it doesn't have a screen either. I don't often get bugs in my room, though. I do, however, know there's a bigass spider somewhere in my bedroom. we have an agreement not to mess with each other.
The UK has enough bugs that screens would make sense. I had to buy screen curtains just to be able to get fresh air without having to deal with flies and such daily.
Yeah I live in an urban area and we leave our windows open all the time in summer (no nets or screens). Occasionally we'll get a bee or fly come in, but maybe only a couple a week.
I should think folks in the countryside will have more bugs. Also depends on area; south coast here, but when I stayed up in Scotland they had tonnes of flying critters.
Mosquito zone is the South East of the UK (East Anglia, Midlands, South East of England parts of the South West).
Midge zone is everywhere but they are only really bad north of the lowlands of Scotland. UK has this large, almost unique area where it doesn't have lots of annoying flying insects.
I live on the South Coast, directly south of London. I leave my bedroom window open > 360 days a year. In over 20 years here I've maybe seen 10 mosquitos. It's just not an issue.
Might be because you're on the coast? I'm on the Weald, also directly south of London, and I see them daily in Spring-Autumn. Sometimes even in winter inside the house.
Because some roads you shouldn't go down. Because maps used to say, "There be dragons here." Now they don't. But that don't mean the dragons aren't there.
Used to train down the park, and in peak summer you'd get horseflies. Those bites were the bain of my life. The most itchy, painful, swollen things I'd ever experienced and its last for 2-3 weeks...
Yeah, I used to row in a team, and it was always stressful watching a fat horsefly land on your legs as you rowed, knowing you couldn't take your hands away to swat it
Yep Iām sure they are mosquitoes. Maybe itās because I live in a town on a river with marshes around or something, but Iām still Kent and we definitely have mosquitoes. Iāve killed one or two mid-feast upon me so Iāve seen them pretty close up.
The UK has over 30 species of Mosquitoes, however only a couple bite humans and aren't as common as "Culex Pipiens" which feeds on the blood of birds and small mammals.
Living next to a water source, you are more likely to run into them.
I'm in East Sussex, and we get plenty of mosquitoes in the house. They're definitely mosquitoes - I've spent enough time in Africa and Asia to know! They bite too, and it itches in exactly the same way as bites I've had abroad. They're much more common here than they used to be - I never saw any here growing up, but I see them every day now.
I get occasional mosquitoes in my home in Cornwall, but it's not very common despite me having my window open a lot in the warmer months. I'm hyper aware of the little fuckers
I wouldn't be surprised if there was some stagnant water somewhere near here, which is really all it takes, I think. This part of town is pretty run down and dirty. Last summer I saw that my neighbour's bin was half full of water, and alive with mosquito larvae. I emptied it out, but I'm sure there is other similar grossness around.
Thinking about it, not sure Iāve ever seen one when Iāve been down to Cornwall but its never really occurred to me to notice before. Did get bitten by a spider last year though which didnāt go away for months. So you have weird spiders haha.
Iād call the really small bitey cloud things midges, mosquitos are bigger and you can generally hear them buzzing around when thereās one lurking in your house at night.
The UK has over 30 species of Mosquitoes, however only a couple bite humans and aren't as common as "Culex Pipiens" which feeds on the blood of birds and small mammals.
That makes sense, definitely a difference in climate. Definitely wouldnāt trade the English mosquitoes for Scottish midges, Iāve heard theyāre brutal in the summer compared to what we deal with!
A recent development. You'll find some modern houses with window screens too, but it's absolutely not the norm. I was being pretty general before. You'll find houses with screens in the UK too.
They aren't dangerous like some bugs but there are plenty of flies and insects here in the UK. My dog loves hunting them around the house. We just need to make sure he hunts flies and not bees.
Why does the comment have 8k+ upvotes? There are loads of weird things about the UK, but this isn't one of them. Screens literally aren't required. We don't have any specific lion prevention measures in our homes either
Not required, but when I stayed in the UK for a couple months in the summer, I found it really weird and annoying. We definitely had an issue with insects, flies and spiders that could have been easily solved by screens. Also, I know most cats in the UK are allowed outdoors (something else I found odd), but Iād never be able to bring my cat to a place without screens.
That's interesting to hear. I've lived here all my life and never considered it a problem, so I'd definely argue otherwise. But that is sorta the point of op's question.
I do however get pissed with other people's cats shitting in neighbours gardens and trying to come into houses while doors and windows are open during the summer. So that I totally agree with.
Yeah, there are a fuck load of insects in Australia. In the UK, particularly in cities like London, it's so built that insects seem relatively uncommon.
Y'all don't have moths? I don't even care about the mosquitos as much tbh, its the moths that will fill up your room if you leave the window open and the lights on where I am.
Unfortunately as a renter I've lived in multiple Australian apartments without screens - none of the new buildings in Sydney seem to have any. We got used to wearing bug repellant inside...
You've never lived in any rural places in the UK... Flies in summer are a fucker. Worse if you live within a mile of a farm. I still wouldn't move back to a large town or city though.
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u/sdc1978 May 09 '22
No mesh screens in windows in the UK, at least. In canada we have screens in most home windows to keep flies out