crickets! Aaaaargh!

Does anyone know how to get rid of crickets? I had one hiding in my apartment (basement) for nearly a week above the furnace pipes, in the corner, in the dark and out of reach. He seems to have become quiet now (pleaaaase tell me he bit the dust!!). All I could do was to spray insecticide up there, but since I couldn't see for sure where he was, I don't think it did much good.

And now, I have *another* cricket IN the vetilation pipes in the bathroom! I was nearly in tears when I heard him this morning, because I've had to get up at 5 every day this week for a project at school and I desperately needed a good night's rest. Short of taking the entire apartment apart trying to find this little bugger (which by now, I'm ready to do!! ) I don't know what else I *can* do... I'm thinking of 2 options: (a) take the grill off the vent and liberally spray insecticide in there and/or (b) take my high-velocity dryer (I'm a groomer) and try to blast him into the bowels of the house somewhere!!

Your cat will be after it. Females are better hunters than the males are. I would be careful what toxins you use for the sake of any pets in the home, and if you have already bombed the area with insecticide, don't let you cat get this cricket.http://www.ehow.com/how_16647_rid-home-crickets.html

God bless Google, has an answer for anything!

i know only to well what its like having crickets in your home, as ive got a lizard that is what he eats, no matter how much my bf is carefull feeding them to the lizard, 1 always manages to escape, not to mention the fact that i am totally 100% terrified of these horrible little creatures , i usually just scream and run away from them .
But one thing i do, if i do see 1 roaming my house, is to just let socks take care of them, he just eats them.

Thanks for the link, Hissy! The only problem is that I don' t have access to a cat... or a lizard for that matter! And my dog is useless at chasing bugs!

My landlady's son took care of a friend's lizards for a few weeks over the Christmas break, and some crickets got loose. I'm guessing these are second generation crickets, 'cause there's no way they would have survived for 2 months! When I got back from my Christmas break, I was finding crickets running around almost every day, but I never seemed to hear them chirping... which is why it's so infuriating now!!

I have kept crickets as pets (I've been told by Japanese friends that in Asia they are sometimes kept in cricket cages as pets) and I know that they need water, maybe you could put out a dish of water nearby & coax it out. They also like dry oatmeal; if you mixed a little dry, boric acid powder,that should prove lethal. But until then, did you know that you can use the chirps to tell the approximate temperature?? Count the number of chirps in 15 seconds, then add 39 to that number - You will have the temperature in Farenheit! (That will give you something to do besides tear out your hair when the little bugger keeps you awake). Also, if you get to see it, you can tell its gender by looking for the ovipositor (looks like a long "stinger") if its a female; although it's the male that chirps, using a file & scraper on his wings to do stridulation. You can do stridulation yourself by scraping your thumbnail across the ridges of a plastic, soda bottle cap. So, no, I can't tell you how to get rid of crickets (JC & Joey say "eat them - they're really tasty & lots of fun to catch") but I can help you make the situation alot more interesting. Maybe your school children would enjoy them as a project - originally, I was forced to get crickets as feed for praying mantises during a "Science for Children Class" project, and wound up liking the crickets more than the praying mantises! Unfortunately, my cat Cinders who had survived on crickets, mantises & such tack when she lived at the highway rest area, thought they were meant for her.....oh,well....I freed the remaining crickets outside on my roses, they loved eating the aphids, so all were happy, except Cinders, who likes fresh meat!! Please keep us posted on how the cricket situation goes! Susan

Originally Posted by thh20

Does anyone know how to get rid of crickets? I had one hiding in my apartment (basement) for nearly a week above the furnace pipes, in the corner, in the dark and out of reach. He seems to have become quiet now (pleaaaase tell me he bit the dust!!). All I could do was to spray insecticide up there, but since I couldn't see for sure where he was, I don't think it did much good.

And now, I have *another* cricket IN the vetilation pipes in the bathroom! I was nearly in tears when I heard him this morning, because I've had to get up at 5 every day this week for a project at school and I desperately needed a good night's rest.

Short of taking the entire apartment apart trying to find this little bugger (which by now, I'm ready to do!!

) I don't know what else I *can* do...

I'm thinking of 2 options: (a) take the grill off the vent and liberally spray insecticide in there and/or (b) take my high-velocity dryer (I'm a groomer) and try to blast him into the bowels of the house somewhere!!

Click to expand...

Are Crickets like Grasshoppers? In this hot weather we have alot of Grasshoppers coming in, and I'm quick to scoop them up and take them out! I hope you have a solution!

Originally Posted by WellingtonCats

Are Crickets like Grasshoppers? In this hot weather we have alot of Grasshoppers coming in, and I'm quick to scoop them up and take them out! I hope you have a solution!

Click to expand...

crickets are like a shorter, stubbier version of a grasshopper, yes. They tend to be brown/black with long antennae and big jumping hind limbs. Do an image search on Google, you'll be able to see the difference.

We had a bearded dragon being "housed" at school this week (I'm in an Animal Care program), and I asked "Stewart"'s owner if I could borrow him for an evening, so he could seek and destroy the crickets, but she said no! oh well, I tried! I guess until they can be lured out of hiding, I can't do much... By the end of the night last night, I had my mp3 player on, wearing earphones and my head buried between the cushions to try and drown out the noise!

Ewww the description if them is enough for me!

I love crickets. Their sound reminds me of a hot summer's night. I miss that sound right now. Send him my way!

I've also been known to rescue them from my cats (in a cup) and place them back outdoors

How about some double sided sticky tape somewhere the cricket hangs out?

In my former life working at the natural gas compressor station we used to have lots of crickets get into the the shop and compressor plants in the summer. It seemed like each year one kind of insect was thriving more than another. I used to name each year the "year of (insert bug name here)". One year there was tons of moths fluttering all over the place, one year there was tons of daddy long leg spiders etc.

Anyway, in my first year there was lots of crickets. If you made a wrinkle in any shop mat there would be crickets hiding under it if you came back a few minutes later. I used to sprinkle around yellow shavings of cricket bait. I can't remember what the name of it was though. -probably an industrial strength product. Look up "cricket bait" in an advanced google search and/or ask your local hardware store for it. You also need to find any possible places of entry and plug them up to prevent future infestation. If it is serious, call an exterminator. They do this kind of thing for a living after all.