What ever you call them, I hate them. I have a primative brain stem-based reaction to them when I see them.

My weekend was ruined by a HUGE roach in the entryway of my apartment here in Tokyo. It was literally three inches wide. I hate them!!

Please, please, please tell me that they aren't a big problem in Madrid. 'Cause in my current state I might have to re-think my plans to move there.

Of course you can find cocroaches in Madrid (at least at my neighbourghood), but you can buy things to kill them or frighten them away without watching them. I cannot think of other insects or bugs in the city, just a few butterflies in summer

Hey anitra, hmmmmmmm... I almost did not take this thread seriously as I can not imagine someone not coming to Madrid because of the possibility of their being too many bugs, it is beyond me

I personally have never seen a roach in my apt. (not one that was not smokeable anyway ) but have seen them at some "choice" restaurants.

As we know, just because I have not seen them at home, does not mean they are not there but "out of sight, out of mind" I guess.

As miguelito said above, we have no major "bug invasions" worth mentioning here in Madrid.

Howeeeeeeveeer... (don't ya just hate those "howevers" ), every once in a while in the Spring going into summer we do get massive moth appearances. Got one 2 yrs. ago but have been lucky the past 2 yrs.

They usually stick to the street lights though.

Ena is ABSOLUTELY TERRIFIED of moths!!!

I always try to tell her that they are just lovely little monotone butterflies but it does not work

Saludos,
jer...

My daughter is also terrified of moths! There has been one sitting on my front door for the past three days and I know if she still lived here she couldn�t even come in the door!

I was trying to imagine the complete size of a cockroach in Japan that is 3 inches wide what the heck must its length be!!!!

We have massive moth infestations here every 6 or 7 years....Irene swears it happens because I open my wallet! (just kidding) :jeje:

We had a humungeous (sp?) butterfly invasion a couple of months ago. They were so pretty! However, today I have been out in my garden and there are sooooo many caterpillars about!!!! Now just where have they come from , and why are my plants all covered in holes

Take the good with the bad I suppose

Nothing lives in my buhardillo, about eight years ago, a roach (non-combustible jer) made it past the anti-bastard death repellant minefield which is the doorway, so I shot him. Word travels fast. :cheers:

quote:

originally posted by tubbymurphy:
[qb] Nothing lives in my buhardillo, about eight years ago, a roach (non-combustible jer) made it past the anti-bastard death repellant minefield which is the doorway, so I shot him. Word travels fast. :cheers: [/qb]

[NOTE: jer: Obligatory thread related bug comment forthcoming at the end of this post...

Tubbymurphy: It's posts like this that constantly convince me that barroom conversations with you at your 'chiringuito' must be a hoot!

My house has no bugs as my guard-Yorkie effectively 'yips' with such an annoying frequency that bugs won't come within 10m. of our home.

:cheers:

quote:

I was trying to imagine the complete size of a cockroach in Japan that is 3 inches wide what the heck must its length be!!!!

It actually wasn't a roach, I have no name for it. It has become "The BUG". Madsue, it was huge! But I must have told 50 people (mostly Japanese) about this BUG and no one has ever seen anything like it (in size).

quote:

Hey anitra, hmmmmmmm... I almost did not take this thread seriously as I can not imagine someone not coming to Madrid because of the possibility of their being too many bugs, it is beyond me

Well, jer, I'm sorry that my existence is beyond your comprehension, but this thing was bigger than my fist and when you live in a one-room apartment it can be quite disruptive. Not to mention the fact that when I returned to my apartment with newly purchased bug spray, I couldn't find it. I didn't go to sleep until 5:30am, and it was during that time that posted my message. Yes, it was a bit tongue-in-cheek, but it is hardly outside the relm of human experience to avoid things that are extremely unpleasurable.

Hola anitra

I can sympathise with you 100% on this topic, and know exactly how you feel about all those nasty creepy crawlies etc, as I have had a few very bad experiences in my life, from very young, and I absolutely detest anything whatsoever coming into my living space, and if it does, I go after it with a vengeance, with guns blazing, I use powders, sprays, you name it, I hit them with it.

In the past, I have suffered from flea infestations, (quite seriously) no jokes here, I mean bad news, you know, hundreds of pounds spent on treatments done by Rentokill, clothes & furnishings destroyed, in order to get rid of it, a real nightmare for me it was I can tell you. Could you imagine going to work, and your colleagues noticing and mentioning that you keep scratching for some reason,

I have had in my childhood the not so common now problem of bed bugs, which to me as a little kid was quite disturbing, to open my eyes and see small red bugs crawling on my pillow, and memories of the corrosive stench of the bug repellent splashed all over the place by my dad, it was not a good time for me.

Then of course, there were the mice, which in the part of London where I grew up, were plentiful in most houses, and probably still are.

But over the last few years, in the place where I live at the moment, I have had 5 serious problems with unpleasant creatures.

1) 4 years ago for about a year or so, I had an Invasion of garden slugs, all over the place every night.

2) 2 years ago, an unbelievable swarm of Ants descended upon this block, and crawled all over it for a week or two. I had Ants getting in through my front door, Man I was angry about that one.

3) A year ago, I had a sudden & totally out of the blue burst of flies in my place, which I have not had here before to any great extent. But all of a sudden one day I saw about a dozen of them on the cupboard in my kitchen, in the main room, the bathroom, everywhere in fact, and this went on for weeks, they just kept coming out from somewhere, dozens of them, and I had to just keep going round and whacking them, and the wiping down all the surfaces with disinfectant afterwards.

4) I have had problems with some mosquitoes, and quite a few Dragon flies before as well. And once again, all I can do is whack them if & when they get in.

5) But for me the real biggy is SPIDERS. Dare I say the word even? It's no joke man, I have been inundated here with them for over 4 years now, and was in fact bitten on my leg 11 months ago, when a big one got into my trousers leg, and I got up late one night, put on my trousers, made a drink, and sat at my PC, went on-line, and felt a tickle on my leg, so I rubbed it, then the tickle turned into an itch, so I scratched it, the itch turned into an intense stinging, so rolled down my trouser leg and saw that there were 2 distinctive bite marks, that looked like I had just had 2 injections, and they were swelling up quite fast. I went to hospital, and they checked me out for any signs of toxic shock etc. but I was okay except for this really intense burning sensation all around the bite marks, and that went on for a few days.

Now, I did get my payback day, when I actually came in from work one evening, and there it was on the wall near my bed. I wont try to detail to you the kind of language I used as I went to war with one of my biggest boots, and smashed it to smithereens. Man it was a big ugly black sucker, real mean looking too, and I still even now today just cannot believe that I was actually bitten by a spider in my own little place, it's just a studio flat you know, not a cottage in the country, but right in the heart of London.

I have had so many spiders in this place over the last 4 years, and have done my best to keep them out, but they just seem to keep coming back again & again, and I just keep smashing them every time I see them, and I don't really know where they keep coming from, I've yet to have the problem dealt with more seriously by the council, and will be getting into that with them in the spring, before they start coming in again.
But they are my main source of hatred right now. I have even had the bastards getting into my bed before, a couple of times, I pulled back the blankets and there was a spider in there, and quite big as well, that really made me angry, so much so in fact, that the next morning after having been up all night, I grabbed hold of the bed and threw it out, and had another one delivered. I had been through everything, and cleaned very carefully, and so I thought they might be breeding inside the bed, underneath or something.

Well anyway, that's my real hatred, the hatred of Spiders, Not fear, I am not scared shitless of them, I just hate & detest them, and cannot and will not share my living space with them, or any other creepy crawly.

Well, there it is, my creepy crawly story. I can't say that I have had any experience of roaches, but have seen a few, here in London, and also in one or two places in Barcelona, and Madrid, but very small & few. I certainly have never heard of a roach being anything like 3 inches wide, they might have been about 33 million years ago, but not now I don't think, even the African Dung beatle is not that big. It would be interesting to find out what it was, if possible. Try keeping a camera ready on the side somewhere in case you see it again, and take a snap of it, then take it to an expert to be identified. You could go to the main zoo and seek advise there, and I know from having worked in a big Zoo for 5 years, that they have got people you can identify such things.

Take care.

Saludos Y Suerte.

Hey anitra.

1) You misunderstood my comment, I was not saying I could not comprehend that you were afraid of the big bug that you saw in your apt. (have seen some very unpleasant ones in my day as well ) but merely that I could not comprehend your not coming to Madrid on the off-chance that one day you might see some bugs here

Please do not read into my posts beyond what they state.

2) I have a better name for your house-guest... "BUGzilla"

Saludos,
jer...

Hey anitra - at least if it was that size it wouldn�t be able to crawl under the door into your apartment, so that is one good thing!!!

Iberian - you seem to have just described my finca almost to a "T". The one thing I don�t have is the bedbugs (though I am sure they are here - just can�t see them!)

This old house of mine is full of wildlife; mice, flies, fleas, spiders (little tiny jumping ones), ants, mosquitoes, termites, one dog and one cat!!! Last year we had a plague of rats, which did upset me, but I tend to accept that I share this farmhouse with the rest of them!

Outside I have lots of caterpillars (as we had a glut of pretty butterflies this year), slugs and some dragonflies. Not too many cockroaches are seen though, which is good, as I hate it when they fly at me.

You folks need cats! My cats kill all the bugs that dare get in the house! You can imagine our bug situation in Florida spiders, roaches, also the flying roaches, ants, fireants, you name it! I bought those electronic bug busters but it didn't work. But the Cats... :cheers:

Booklady, I have a cat (she�s the one that infests the house with fleas!). Her name is Mouse, cos.......... she�s the colour of, well, a mouse!!!!! She also catches the mice, plays with them, they snuggle up under her legs and she can�t see them as they are the same colour, so she walks away bored, and the mice scamper back into the walls!!!

Eek! Sadly during the summer my cats Cleo and Miss Kitty do bring in fleas, but I put on them a flea infestation med that I buy on the Internet and that fixes the poor dears. They are fearless and relentless fighters against unwanted bugs and any animal smaller than them.