No-See-Ums?

My wife and I have been fighting these same bugs for awhile now. We too thought we were going crazy. My wife gets bit constantly more so than I and we don’t see anything bite us, but do see large swollen areas all over our knees, ankles and lower legs, sometimes elbows depending if we are sitting on the couch or what not. The bugs go on car rides with us, sometimes biting us up to 30-60 minutes after we’ve left the house. The itching is so intense and if you itch it gets much worse. We covered the house in Borax head to toe for 72hrs and vacuum daily and it seems to help somewhat, but the biting continues. It’s not fleas, we’ve had flea’s before and you can see those guys jumping when heat gets nearby. These bugs are driving us f*cking crazy and my wife is about to loose it. Our landlord doesn’t believe us because it didn’t happen to him when he lived here 8yrs ago. We get bit in the winter but it’s definitely worse in the summer.

Makes me relieved to hear others with same issue, but I hope someone can find out what kills these un-seeable things. PLEASE HELP.

I thought I was going crazy so I’m glad to see others are in the same boat. I’m in North Jersey.

I’ve tried everything – clean out drains, eliminated house plants & standing water, make sure garbage is emptied, all fruit is now in the refridgerator & banannas are in a clear container. Spraying rooms with Raid flying insect repellent helped a lot but they come back. I really don’t want all these chemicals in my house for me & my dogs.

The worst is when I try to sleep at night. I’ve started spraying myslef with “Off” before bed – works for a little while only.

There are tons of them outside – could be my flowers or the neighbor’s bamboo. Can’t open the foor for even a second or they fly in.

I’m wondering if it’s worse than ever this year – maybe with the heat/global warming or something.

Wow, finally, also a site where people are talking REAL about this problem. I think if all of us just keep on talking and then DEMAND some answers from the “professionals” at our State levels something will get done about this really horrible problem. I have had this problem at my former house and now my at the house I live in now! It’s ridiculous. I have these bugs sticking on me and taking rides with me to work! I am itchy everywhere I go, and of course at night at “home”! Sometimes I don’t even want to go home because I know what to expect: more itching!
My thing is NOT to use ANY chemicals if at all possible. I know there HAS to be a natural way to deter these bugs and the more we all talk about it the more we will find a logical, simple, and clean, non-chemical solution.
Three things that I did that helped for at least 1-2 days -was vaccum (with my ceiling fans on-which I think helped to bring the creatures down to where they could be vaccumed) and washed the clothes/bedding. I bought a very powerful wet/dry vaccum from home Depot (5 horse power) that has a filter in it and vaccumed every where I could.
And I blocked up a couple of holes in my flooring that had been open from a cable company.

To be honest, I suspect that the vaccuming only worked for a couple of days because the creatures are festering BELOW my home in the crawl space and are just finding their way up.I can vaccum until I am blue in the face but until I vaccum below the house in the crawl space too, I may not get good results. It would be a chore to vaccum in the basement because it’s small and dark and has dirt, not cement flooring. Does anyone know anyone who could clean up/vaccum a crawl space?

I really like the idea that
Paige (March 8, 2007) offered about buying an air purifier to pull in the creatures! It makes logical sense that they’d be able to be pulled in since they are seemingly light wieght and could be pulled in. This idea is natural and seems safe plus cleans the air on top of it. It was also a great idea to try to see the creatures by using a flashlight in the dark! I have been trying to see what they are too.
Finally, I would like to recommend people vaccum for now and use a ceiling fan to push the critters down to be pulled in by the vaccum.
Please continue to post any ideas you all have too.
Thanks for listening!
-JM Richmond, CA

grateful for this site and to know that unfortunately I am not alone with this.

I am beloved by Mosquitoes and in MO was discovered by chiggers. I moved into a country house in NC that is pretty open air. It was open air beneath being on stone piers. I have indoor-outdoor cats. Whenever I stood by the kitchen sink I would feel tiny bites on my legs. At night in bed I could feel critters moving on me but could never see anything. late last summer I moved into sleeping into a tent on the front porch – – my feline family slept with me without incident. I observed that when there was a downpour of rain I was never bitten while sleeping in the house. Late in October I thought I had acquired scabies. Maybe it was simply the no-see-ums gone beserk in the high humidity. I used apple cider vinegar baths and covered myself with neem oil with good result. I subsequently moved out of the house though I certainly miss the country and the people in the neighborhood.

flooring: linoleum – – a very open air house.

fields: don’t know where the nearest corn field might be. this is tobacco country in the Piedmont. there was a soybean field on 3 sides of the house. sycamore tree. maple. pecan. some shrubs.

baseboards: wood.