Full water butts are ideal breeding grounds for mosquitoes. If you don't take immediate action against the mosquito larvae, you risk a mosquito plague.
In the summer, mosquitoes can become a real nuisance. For example, when they buzz around in a large flock in the garden or even in the house. Although you cannot completely prevent mosquitoes from buzzing through your garden, you can specifically minimize their population. Mosquitoes need standing water to lay their eggs. A water butt is therefore the best breeding ground for these insects. However, if you know this, there are a number of things you can do to prevent mosquito infestations.
Destroy mosquito larvae in the rain barrel
The removal of mosquito larvae from the water butt has top priority. After the larvae hatch from the eggs, they remain on the water surface for a while before flying around. However, they can only sit on the surface if there is the right surface tension. So if you want to get rid of the bugs, you have to break that surface tension.
Tip 1 - Vegetable Oil:
One way to destroy them is to suffocate the insects with oil. All you have to do is add a few drops of any vegetable oil from the kitchen to the water. The larvae should then die within a very short time.
Tip 2 - Detergent:
As an alternative to vegetable oil, you can also drip some washing-up liquid into the water. A tablespoon on a large rain barrel should be enough. You can still use the rainwater to water your garden afterwards, as long as you use a 100 percent biodegradable product.
Tip 3 - NEUDORFF mosquito free:
You can also buy very special preparations in every garden store or in the hardware store, with which the larvae in the water (water butts, garden ponds and other bodies of water) can be fought and which are also biodegradable and therefore harmless. These remedies are made on the basis of proteins, so they do not harm people, wild animals, beneficial insects, fish or other organisms. Put e.g. products like the NEUDORFFMosquito-free, the existing stock of mosquito larvae is completely destroyed.
Prevent the emergence of mosquito larvae
Tip 4 - Cover the rain barrel:
Better than any measure to combat mosquitoes is of course prevention, so you can save yourself a lot of effort and trouble. It is ideal if you provide your water butt with a lid.
Alternatively, you can stretch a fly screen over it in summer. But don't forget the downpipe, because that's where the mosquitoes can slip through. So you must also cover this with a fine-meshed net.
Tip 5 - Empty the rain barrel:
It takes about three weeks for the mosquito larvae to develop before they are ready to fly. If you empty the water butt completely during this period, you do not need to take any further action.