In the years we raised our family in Colorado we made a lot of friends and acquaintances… but none of them were bugs. Actually that’s not true; every now and then a spider would introduce itself; somehow enduring the region’s high altitude and low oxygen. But the other 99.9% of the world’s insect population flew south for the winter… and stayed there. Or rather, here. Right here on the property where we now live. On that not-so-exaggerated claim let’s you and I make a deal. I’ll happily take all of your cicadas, wasps, and fire ants in exchange for my countless gnats.
A gnat may be the most annoying living thing you’ll ever encounter, (including every last one of your family members). Anyone who’s experienced an out-of-nowhere cloud of these little dive-bombers knows what I’m talking about. Gnats are so tiny instead of “now you see ’em, now you don’t” you just say no-see-um. Gnats are so whiny you’ll swear your ears are being perforated by dozens of microscopic dentist drills. Finally, gnats have such a sense of smell that once you give off your particular scent (i.e. sweat) they’ll happily follow you to the ends of the earth.
Here’s what a gnat looks like (blown up a million, billion times). I’m not surprised to see they’re a relatively simple-looking creature. After all, there can’t be much to something beyond microscopic. In all fairness, a gnat’s virtual invisibility has to do with a preference for shade, nighttime hours and things that grow. At least that’s my experience. I’m out there walking the dog on a humid summer evening and it’s as quiet as the “g” in gnat. Suddenly the little air force shows up out of nowhere and for the rest of the walk you’re swatting your head every time you hear a dentist drill. And it’s not like you kill gnats with your swats (or maybe you do but they’re so small you have no idea if you did, so why bother?)
Entering this third summer of my newfound cloud of Southern friends, I decided it was time to go on the offensive. My wife bought a stack of human-head sized mosquito nets. These nets work great in that you’ll no longer feel that slightest of sensations when a gnat lands on your ear. But the little sand grains still knock-knock-knock on the net with their dentist-drill buzzes. You still swat and you still no-see-um. Not to mention, a sweaty mosquito net is really uncomfortable.
A month or so ago we were at our local farm supply and came across this product at check-out. The cashier was all about it, so I figured I’d give it a try. Gnats don’t like particular botanicals: citronella, lemongrass, rosemary, and geranium, and No Natz has them all in a nice little spray cocktail. Darned if the stuff doesn’t work! You put it on like sunscreen, you smell like an entire can of Lemon Pledge, but the gnats keep their distance. For a little while anyway. Eventually you sweat off the No Natz and then it’s “mo natz” all over again.
I might have to try a batch of pyrethrins instead (my new favorite word). Pyrethrins are compounds found in chrysanthemums which, conveniently, target the nervous system of a gnat. Gets at ’em from the inside out. The idea of a gnat spiraling out of control like a wounded helicopter is entirely appealing in my present state of mind.
Per Wikipedia, there is “no scientific consensus on what constitutes a gnat”. Whichever ones are my new best friends here are harmless because they just buzz around your eyes and ears making their dentist-drill noises. Other varieties prefer biting and blood so I guess I should be grateful. Doesn’t make “Gnatus South Carolinus” any less annoying.
Maybe subscribing to the alleged origin of “no-see-um” will put me out of my misery. The word is rooted in skeptical theism. That is, if a human (me) thinks hard enough about a given thing (gnat) and can’t come up with a single God-justifying reason for permitting such an organism (nope, not one), AND considering said organism can’t be seen (they’re invisible!) then perhaps I should entertain the notion that a gnat doesn’t really exist.
Yes, let’s go with skeptical theism. There aren’t any gnats in South Carolina after all (hooray!) Ignore the previous 500+ words of this post. My countless friends were all in my head. Or uh, around my head? Whatever.. guess I’m just hearing things.
Some content sourced from Wikipedia, “the free encyclopedia”.
Life In A Word 
In the 1990’s when I took quite a few business trips to Georgia, I was amazed when crossing some line into gnat territory. The residents seemed used to being behind netting and reflexively waving them away from their faces. I could not live like that just as they probably couldn’t live through Seattle’s wet and gloomy winter weather!
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That’d be a good blog topic, Geoff. The things we couldn’t stand (if we weren’t already standing them). I agree about Seattle. My lifetime has taken me from CA to CO to SC, so I can’t imagine putting up with constant gloomy and wet!
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A very informative and humorous post Dave! I never knew no-see-um’s were actually gnats. I’d never even heard of them until a few years ago, when I was complaining about all my mosquito bites and my neighbour said her backyard was full of no-see-ums. I would go out to water in the evenings and come back in with bites on my legs but never see anything, and often never felt anything. Her backyard had a lot of greenery and a large fish pond and we’d had a very wet summer that year, so the humidity must have been a breeding ground for them. I find their bites much worse than a mosquito bite in that they can itch for 3 or 4 days. I’m sure they had gotten into the house through the screens that summer, as you indicate, as I was so covered with bites I ended up seeing the doctor for steroid creams and Rx antihistamines they itched that bad. But I haven’t seen one since – so you keep them down there Dave! PS. I was on a Windjammer cruise once in the Caribbean and we had a day trip to a deserted island for snorkeling, and in the evening when the boat came back to pick us up the gnats descended. I couldn’t wait to get onboard and sail away, and I well remember the feeling of being surrounded by a cloud of those mean little biting monsters! PS. The spray sounds interesting.
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Yes, something about twilight really brings out the gnats. If only I could work around that time of day to walk the dog. To your experiences, I’m really glad “our” gnats are simply annoying versus biting. Otherwise I might be shopping for head-to-toe netting!
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I don’t know what kind of gnats these are but they bite and then you have an intense itch for 3 or 4 days. Not fun. That summer I hardly went into the backyard at all, maybe a quick run to the plantar box to pick some tomatoes and that’s it. But I haven’t seen them since, probably because we’ve had some dry drought like summers.
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Great information, but I’m not sure I want to smell like Lemon Pledge. I guess it’s only temporary. I am lucky that gnats don’t seem to like the desert, but we get surprising number of mosquitos.
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Your environment, climate, and altitude – like Colorado’s – is pretty darned ideal when it comes to bugs. You must be near water if you’re dealing with mosquitos. I think we subconsciously chose the location of our property down here because there isn’t a lake, pond, or stream anywhere nearby (which attracts a lot more than just mosquitos!)
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Gnats sound very annoying! (Where is the photo of YOU in the mesh mask hat?)
We do not have Gnats here but at certain times of the year we have mosquitoes. Not this year so far, though. What we do have is oodles of ants. Some of them have made a nest in the vaulted ceiling of our house. Some of them bite. Fortunately none of them are no-see-ums which makes it much easier for me to wage war.
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We probably have one ant for every two gnats around here. In the late spring our property turns into a maze of tiny ant hills for the summer. The vast majority are harmless but you have to keep an eye out – and spray for – fire ants. I’ve heard their bites are worse than bee stings. So far (knock on an anthill) I can’t speak from experience.
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Ugh to bugs – why did God let them on the ark anyway? I had a black wasp in the house last week. I was sitting her at the table on my laptop when it came out of nowhere and it aimed for the swag lamp over my head, missed and fell on the table. You never saw someone spring into action so quickly. I used half a roll of paper towels to scoop it up, then stuffed the still-alive wasp in the paper towels into one large Ziploc bag, then for good measure, another Ziploc bag. Before I went to bed, I put all that into a large, empty Quaker Oats Oatmeal canister. I kept wondering how long it had been in the house and thankfully not while I was sleeping – yikes!
I’m glad the No Nats works, at least long enough to walk the dog anyway unless the walk is lengthy in the humidity. Years ago we got a flying Carpenter ant in the basement and I saw it go into the fluorescent light fixture and it didn’t come out. Our dumb luck, that ant must have been the queen and laid eggs. Soon we had Carpenter ants in the house. We got Ortho Pest Control in and they sprayed a milky-looking liquid around the house and also drilled holes 18 inches apart in the baseboards and sprayed a strong powder in. We cut down two Oak trees in the backyard, one Locust tree in the front yard, removed the Redwood bark from the perimeter gardens, replaced it with Cypress mulch to repel ants – we still had ants! Our HVAC guy recommend a small pest control service he used for his rental homes. That tech came to the house dressed in camouflage clothing, army boots and told us “I will make those ants cease and desist!” My mom and I rolled our eyes after he went to do his thing, his thing being spritzing Marigold dust in the rafters. I had told Ortho where I saw the ant go into the fixture when they did their inspection – maybe they didn’t believe me, because when I mentioned it to this guy, he climbed up, found the nest right away, sprayed a few poofs of Marigold dust and ants were dropping from the dropped ceiling. They climbed out from hiding places and fell onto the floor dead. All over the basement – none upstairs. Do not discount the power of botanicals – the mums may work!
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Protecting the house from bugs is serious business down here. We (and every one of our neighbors) use a twice-a-year service that treats the perimeter of any structure to create a seemingly impenetrable barrier. Every now and then we’ll get a wasp or spider in the house but only because they fly through an open door or hitch a ride on the dog. For the most part we leave the (outdoor) wasps alone because the locals tell us they take care of some of the bad bugs and spiders. The trick in all of this is finding strategies for cohabitation because the bugs certainly aren’t going anywhere. But I sure wish the gnats would 😉
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A friend of mine grew up in South Carolina, which I think is a bit hotter and more humid than your state, but she used to tell me about the Palmetto bugs (they look like roaches) flying around in their home. I also had the perimeter sprayed for spiders and centipedes – once a season and twice a year in the basement and garage for about 15 years. I stopped the service when I got insulation blown in as it supposedly had an insecticide in the cellulose. I beg to differ with that though. Maybe I should free my wasp because centipedes and spiders are the bane of my existence. 🙂 Good luck with your gnats Dave.
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I like this skeptical theism concept of which you speak. We have gnats and we have no-see-ums, so I grow pots of rosemary and some years citronella. I can’t claim that they do much but they look pretty, smell lovely. I’ll look for the spray you mention. I have more faith in that product than my pretties.
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I would’ve thought rosemary and citronella plantings would do the trick. Bummer, but good to know. You’ll find a very small amount of both in No Natz (0.5% of active ingredients). Must be quite concentrated!
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The idea of skeptical theism you mentioned is intriguing.
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Gnats are the worst. I chuckled, when I was young and in Italy, when my grandfather went to bed, he put that net on his head. I thought he was NUTS, but reading your post, sounds like it could work.
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Oh my gosh. This is so funny, Dave. I especially liked your bit about including every last family member. I do not live in gnat territory. I despise mosquitoes the most, but at least they don’t swarm me. Love your whole logic though. I guess gnats don’t even exist. Does this comment exist? This post? This blog? Do I exist? Talk about spiraling into an existential crisis, Dave! Thanks a lot!
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I’ll be keeping skeptical theism in my back pocket for the occasional coping need. It’s a useful tool!
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Ugh, I’m glad there aren’t so many gnats up north! You make me realize that it took a combination of air conditioning and pest control to make the south any place a northerner would want to live!
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We’re working on getting a generator installed. Things had cooled down to reasonable by the time Hurricane Helene passed through and knocked out the power for several days last fall. Had she decided to make a summer visit I can’t imagine what it would’ve been like without A/C. Yes, pest control is almost as essential as A/C, to keep the bugs and spiders outdoors where they belong.
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