Excerpt from “Valley 101: A Slightly Skewed Guide to Living in Arizona,” a collection of Clay Thompson’s columns for The Arizona Republic. (Originally published July 18, 1999.)
Q: Help! My house is overrun with scorpions, and I hate them.
A: How ungracious of you. First of all, the scorpions were here first, and secondly, they absolutely adore you.
And what do they get from you? The back of your Reebok.
And, in a way, it’s your fault there are so many of them in the first place. Well, not your fault personally, but our fault collectively.
There are about 35 species of scorpions in Arizona, but only five or six in the Phoenix area, including our personal favorite, the giant hairy scorpion.
All are venomous. That’s their stock-in-trade. But according to Marilyn Bloom, a microbiology research specialist at Arizona State University, there is only one species that really needs concern us: the bark scorpion.
This is a nasty little critter, skinny and yellowish in color, and it’s sting can cause intense pain, numbness and, at least in theory, death. Bloom said there are no accounts of anyone dying of a scorpion sting in the 40 years that records have been kept.
Bloom has an interesting job. With the help of three goats, she produces scorpion antivenin for distribution to area hospitals, doctors and veterinarians. During the summer, she gets a dozen or so requests for antivenin a week.
Here’s how to tell if your scorpions are bark scorpions: Only bark scorpions climb vertical surfaces. If your scorpions confine themselves to scurrying along the floor, you’re probably OK. If you’re finding them on the walls or in your drapes or climbing up the side of your house (or your leg), you’ve got a problem.
Weather stripping and caulking and can prevent scorpions from entering your home. Photo credit: istock
There are scorpions all over the Valley, but many of us have gone for years without ever seeing one, much less getting stung. Some people believe they are more common in areas where new housing is encroaching on the scorpions’ natural desert habitat. That’s only partly true, according to Bert Putterman, general manager of
Arizona Exterminating Co.
On a hunk of untouched desert, the scorpion count may be relatively low, Putterman said, “but when a development comes in, suddenly there might be thousands to an acre.” That’s because when houses and humans show up, “it’s just like a Furr’s Cafeteria moved in” to scorpions, he said.
“Scorpions are extremely environmentally compatible with us,” Putterman said. That’s because humans come bearing gifts, mostly scorpion food and shelter.
Our security lights and streetlights attract bugs, which, in turn, attract scorpions. Our rock gardens and woodpiles and laundry rooms and well-watered lawns provide shelter and water. We’re the best thing that ever happened to scorpions.
So, as the urban area grows, so does the scorpion population.
“Twenty years ago, when I first moved here, we’d get three or four calls a summer for scorpions, and we’d go out on them just as a novelty,” Putterman said. “Ten years ago, we could identify specific areas of infestation
(around the Valley.) Today, 75 percent of the calls we get are for scorpions.”
If you do have scorpions in your house, it’s probably not by their choice. Scorpions are most comfortable in conditions 75 to 95 degrees, Putterman said, and chances are the coolness of your house makes them sluggish. They’d just as soon be outside, perhaps under that nice cool damp towel your kids left on the lawn after they played in the sprinkler.
Because scorpions are nocturnal and most exterminators are not, spraying them probably isn’t going to have much effect. Short of a direct hit, most pesticides don’t really bother scorpions much. On the other hand, spraying will kill their food source, bugs.
But killing the bugs might not make that much difference. Bloom says a healthy scorpion can go nine to 12 months without eating. That means a bark scorpion would be perfectly content to curl up in the toe of a seldom-worn shoe for months on end.
Putterman and Bloom offered a number of tips for keeping scorpions away:
- Switch your outdoor lights from white bulbs to yellow. Yellow light doesn’t attract bugs the way white light does.
- Check your weather-stripping. If you can slide a business card under your weather-stripping, there’s enough room for a scorpion to wiggle through.
- Caulk or otherwise plug the spaces where electrical, phone or waterlines enter your house. Ditto in the kitchen and bathrooms where pipes come out of the wall.
- Clear away, or at least frequently move, woodpiles or any other stuff you might have stacked up near your house.
- Don’t leave wet towels on the ground around a pool or spa. Conversely, if you want to catch scorpions, leave a damp towel on your kitchen floor overnight. In the morning, pick it up, with tongs or with gloves on, and see what came calling.
- The redwood bark some folks use as mulch looks nice on flowerbeds, but it’s a scorpion magnet. If you’re digging around it, wear gloves and keep your eyes open.
Eliminating crickets in and around your home seems to help. Scorpions love having crickets for supper. And I don’t mean as guests.
We spray every month and plug up every little gap we can find and yet we have seen two scorpions in the house this spring, however by this time we usually see 4 or 5 so things do seem to be better. I would suggest if your having problems placing sticky boxes in area’s you may be finding an un-welcome visitor and also scorpion powder next to your doors, provided you don’t have pets. Apart from that just be careful by wearing something on your feet when walking around the house and knocking your shoes out before putting them on just in case. My wife has stepped on and been stung by bark scorpions twice over the last 7 years. It’s not fun so I’d say the most important thing is to knock out your shoes and look before reaching into blind spaces just in case.
I have a scorpion infestation, and I am ready to sell my house and move on. Over the last 5 years, I have killed approximately 40-50 scorpions inside my home. I have had the exterminator out many times, but it doesn’t seem to help much. Sticky traps have been my best defense so far. I am thinking about plugging up all the weep holes in the brick exterior, and covering the vents on the soffits with a window screen, and maybe putting sticky traps in the attic where the vents are. Does anyone have any other ideas? I have already surrounded my bed with sticky traps so they can’t get us at night.
I’m at the point where I can’t sleep with the lights off any more.
For many years, we have put a line of “diatomaceous earth” around the parameter of our house.
It is most commonly known as the white powder used in pool filtration systems… (Not sand)
“D.E.” is known to cut the under surface of the scorpions…Also, it sticks to them and they end up carrying it back to their nest where it spreads to others..
Seems to be one of the best defenses.
Not sure if anyone is still having trouble with scorpions (but I’m sure you are since they’re tough to get rid of completely
) but ABC15 is advertising a story that airs on Monday, May 6 about scorpions, hunting them with blacklights and things that do/don’t work to get rid of them: http://bit.ly/168HmuN
If you’ve found a scorpion in your home or your backyard, calling Scorpion Hunters with ABC15 might be a good idea. They’ll tell you how to kill it and how to prevent them from getting in your home. There’s a story that’ll be airing on Monday at 10 p.m. in case anybody’s interested! With the weather warming up and more scorpions coming out the play I highly recommend it: http://bit.ly/10d4QGK
Sheila, you have my deepest sympathy. I cannot imagine having to live with so many of the little buggers. It must be scary, indeed.
The big problem with scorpions is that powders and residual paints or sprays don’t work very well on them. They have very small feet and carry their bodies high, so they can go through powder or residual sprays pretty safely.
If this has not already been done, I would try to find a pest control company that will come out at night and use black light. Scorpions fluoresce under black light so, even if they are hiding in crevices, they can be seen more easily. They are also nocturnal (active at night), so they should be more easily sprayed directly, then.
I don’t know if I’m allowed to mention a business name here – I normally wouldn’t, but this seems like a desperate situation – but I was told by someone from Captain’s Pest Control that there is a fairly recent insecticide compound that they use in battling scorpions. If I understood his explanation correctly, it is comprised of a sticky “carrier” and tiny microbeads. The microbeads contain poison. The substance is painted or sprayed in strategic places. When a scorpion walks through it, some of it sticks to its feet. When it tries to clean the substance off of its feet, it ingests some of the microbeads and is killed by the poison. I don’t have anything to do with that company, but I do know that they have been successful in dealing with a scorpion infestation in a large commercial job. It would be worth contacting them, or at least calling around to find out who else may be using that method of control. Best of luck!
Another bug point-of-entry indoors — the exhaust fan openings for bathroom, kitchen and laundry rooms. Block them by cutting screen door material to fit the fan opening, remove the fan cover, then glue the fitted screen to the bottom of the ceiling around the edges of the opening, and reinstall the fan cover.
I took your advice and did this. As well as putting cedar mulch in our flower beds. And putting window sealant around all the windows. I also noticed that everywhere there is a plumbing entry into my home, the builder left huge gaps open to the interstitial wall cavity. I have now plugged all of them with plumbers putty. We have not seen a scorpian in about 5 months now. THIS IS A RECORD!!!!! This is working, and I am now sleeping with the lights off!!!!!
Good work, Sheila! Keepin’ ‘em outside is half the battle. Good riddance!