{"id":653,"date":"2010-07-16T08:10:58","date_gmt":"2010-07-16T16:10:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/katherinemalmo.com\/blog\/?p=653"},"modified":"2011-05-05T13:45:22","modified_gmt":"2011-05-05T21:45:22","slug":"mosquitoes-and-bats","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.katherinemalmo.com\/blog\/2010\/07\/16\/mosquitoes-and-bats\/","title":{"rendered":"Mosquitoes (and Bats!)"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Begging for a bat house<\/p><\/div>\n

The garden is doing well (thanks for asking), so well in fact, that we are awash in broccoli. If anyone comes within 10 feet of the house, I force them to take a crown. I pretty much throw broccoli at passersby. It\u2019s like reverse Halloween over here. I\u2019ve given away so much broccoli that Josie has decided that along with happy birthday<\/em>, enjoy your broccoli <\/em>is a standard greeting. She\u2019s also in a no-clothes phase of life so our little naked wood nymph has been running around the yard yelling, enjoy your broccoli!<\/em> to anyone who will listen (ie: the dog).<\/p>\n

And this little anecdote has nothing to do with what I really want to write about. Total change of subject. Are you ready?<\/p>\n

Mosquitoes! The hysterical\u2019s guide to mosquito repellant (kind of). We don\u2019t have much of a problem here in the northwest with bugs so I\u2019m really not qualified to comment but, as usual that won\u2019t stop me. I came across an interesting article<\/a> that says wind, even a small amount from a house fan, is an effective deterrent. Mosquitoes are attracted to the carbon dioxide we exhale, sweat, lactic acid and body heat. The fan works not just because it makes it hard for the lil\u2019 buggers to land, but because it disperses our breath and cools us down. So get an extension cord and move that fan outside.<\/p>\n

Also bats! I love bats. Really. I\u2019m fascinated by them and collect odd bat facts. I don\u2019t know why. I keep thinking I will write something that has to do with bats someday but it never happens. Maybe this is it. Maybe this is my big bat story. Did you know that the Brazilian Free-tailed bat consumes 200-600 insects per night? And, the bats of Texas consume 6-18,000 metric tons of insects each year. You\u2019re welcome for that. Anyway, buy them a house<\/a>. (You can even buy one that looks like a castle.) Paint it black.\u00a0Maybe it would be tough to carry with you when you go hiking but it could help for those nights on the back deck.<\/p>\n

Okay, seriously, this is probably no help at all. It\u2019s definitely no help for those of you who want to leave<\/em> your yard. Any of you peeps living in mosquito-laden lands have suggestions on keeping them away without harming your children or the planet?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The garden is doing well (thanks for asking), so well in fact, that we are awash in broccoli. If anyone comes within 10 feet of the house, I force them to take a crown. I pretty much throw broccoli at passersby. It\u2019s like reverse Halloween over here. I\u2019ve given away so much broccoli that Josie […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-653","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mom","category-hmn-reports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.katherinemalmo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/653","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.katherinemalmo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.katherinemalmo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.katherinemalmo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.katherinemalmo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=653"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.katherinemalmo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/653\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1089,"href":"https:\/\/www.katherinemalmo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/653\/revisions\/1089"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.katherinemalmo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=653"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.katherinemalmo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=653"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.katherinemalmo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=653"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}