Well, it’s mortal for them, anyway. I hope it’s not potentially mortal for me. They are gnats, not mosquitos and, besides, the UAE hasn’t had a reported case of malaria since 1997 …
Anyway, did I mention on this blog that we had mushrooms growing out of the rotting wood beneath the kitchen sink? I did? Creepy.
Well, the mushrooms have stopped growing … because the gnats have moved in. And now I’m investigating ways to try to get those little beasts under control. It has become clear to us that smacking a dozen of them between our hands each night is not really putting a dent in their population.
How did they get here? Flew in the door, I suppose. A couple of them. They found a wet and dark spot in the same bit of rotten wood the mushrooms took over, and since then …
I feel almost as if this is my punishment for suggesting that Abu Dhabi didn’t have many insects. Well, on the fifth floor of a high rise, no, they don’t. But at a ground-level apartment, yes, they do. (Killed a hopping spider today. Hopping.)
After clapping the gnats into pulp for a week or so but not seeing their numbers diminish, we bought some Windex. For the ammonia. And ammonia knocks ’em down, all right. The ones who come hopping out of the crack between the sink cabinet and the washing machine … one squirt of Windex, and that’s it. Seven at one blow.
It’s even more fun to knock them out of the air with the Windex. They drop like little tiny rocks. But then you’re spritzing the room with ammonia, and that’s not really what you want.
After about two weeks of this, we have reached a standoff. They are still here … but they have not yet taken over the house. A balance of terror.
I just did a search for gnats on google … and no sooner did I have the word “gnat” typed in than it suggested “getting rid of” for me … and there I went.
This site has some good suggestions. Guess I need to buy some vinegar. And I hadn’t really made the connection to water and gnats. So just now I thoroughly doused the drains in the kitchen, bathroom and shower. Let’s see if that slows them down at all.
I checked the trash, and they aren’t going there. We have no fruit sitting out. Mostly, it is clear, they seem to be coming out of the rotting wood. Even after I have doused it with Windex a dozen times.
They are annoying. They tend to flit in front of your face or just barely in the sight of the corner of your eye, and you find yourself chasing them around. Which is silly. They don’t seem to bite — maybe just nibble, a little? Sometimes?
So, maybe a couple of nights of this, perhaps augmented by sugar/vinegar traps …
Meantime, we talk to the landlord about replacing the crumbling cabinet below the sink. And fixing a fan, and repairing the electrical outlets in the bedroom …
And yes, Abu Dhabi, here in the desert of the Arabian Peninsula … most certainly has insects. I live with a few hundred of them. Maybe they will go away when the weather is torrid? Maybe not.
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