With mosquitoes, I'm torn between not at all enjoying being bitten, and not wanting to poison with pesticides all the small stuff that eats the mosquitoes, like the tiny native fish in my pond, the smaller frogs in my garden, and the microbats. Especially the microbats, which live in my woodshed and in the little bat refuges I put up in the trees. So I swat the mozzies if they try to bite me, burn citronella candles if I'm sitting outdoors at night, and try to encourage the small insectivores.
I leave the native wasps alone (the first spider-eating wasp of spring tried to drown itself in my orange juice last night, and was carefully escorted outdoors). However, hornets and European wasps, which don't belong here, are ruthlessly squashed, and I will destroy their nests. I have a wasp trap which works well for European wasps -an open-topped large glass bottle half full of water, containing a small piece of rotting meat and a few drops of detergent to break surface tension of the water, so the wasps sink if they touch it. The native wasps prefer fruit, flower nectar or live prey, mostly spiders and caterpillars, so they aren't attracted to it. European wasps that land near me get hit with a flyswat or a rolled newspaper. Can you buy flyswats in Iceland, Laufey?
