There are probably lots of bugs in your house right now that stink when you squash them. But that doesn’t mean they’re stinkbugs.
They’re more likely to be western conifer seedbugs or box elder bugs. They might be actual stinkbugs — brown marmorated stinkbugs — but as far as most of us are concerned, it doesn’t really matter. They all look alike and more or less smell alike.
And they’re more or less not really a problem.
“They’re a nuisance and annoying but generally not causing harm to people, pets, structures,” said state entomologist Piera Siegert, with the state Department of Agriculture.
If you hate the post-squash smell, she suggests sweeping them out the door or vacuuming them up, although don’t forget to empty the vacuum bag or it might turn into a stinkbomb next time you use it. Definitely don’t use any bug spray; that’s a waste of money.
It seems to me and the Monitor newsroom that the population of maybe-its-a-stinkbug has exploded this year. Certainly, I have more in my house right now than in the past several years, when I saw hardly any following an outbreak around 2020.
It’s hard to tell for sure, however, because nobody keeps track of numbers statewide from year to year. Siegert says the department used to get a loose idea of population trends from the number of people who called or emailed to ask, “What is this bug I found?” But the growth in bug-identifying apps has removed that input.
As with everything else in life, people now pose questions to their phones.
Whatever the numbers, the reason these bugs are showing up is obvious: to escape winter, the same reason that mice are showing up in your attic.
“If you didn’t have a house, they’d find a crevice, a cave, or crack in bark to hide in,” said Seigert.
You can try to keep them out by sealing cracks, especially around doors and windows, but don’t get your hopes up. They’re flat, they’re persistent, and they’ll find their way in if they really want to.
Many insects have population cycles from year to year that depend on the weather, how their main food source is doing or on the cycle of their main predator. It might be that, for whatever reason, we’re on a stinkbug upswing right now.
Over the long run — a couple of decades — the pattern is steadier, and the numbers have definitely grown. The stinkbug is an invasive that arrived around 2010, while the western conifer seedbug moved east in the early 2000s. The box elder bug is native.
A similar bug that is heading this way is the disease-carrying “kissing bug” that often carries the parasite that causes Chagas disease, a painful and deadly ailment. Our winters are keeping it at bay, but we all know what climate change is doing to our winters.
By the way, these truly are bugs unlike some other bug-named beasties. To an insect specialist, a “bug” is a specific order of insect, with sucking or piercing mouthparts, distinct from beetles, flies and other insects. Ladybugs, for example, are actually beetles. Ticks and spiders, of course, aren’t insects at all since they have eight legs.
