You need to consult askthebugman.com
He writes a weekly column in the SF Chron :)

You think you've got problems...we've been inundated w/the Asian Stink Bugs! They also love soy beans...and just about anything else people grow for crops!

Yes, they're from CHINA (and, possibly Japan, Korea and Taiwan)! There's no known way to mass-exterminate them safely on the inside safely! (You can drown them in water & dish detergent pretty quickly.)

I have friends who have had to seal off rooms b/c of infestations! At least two friends have their kids sleeping on the sofa b/c their bedrooms are infested and it smells so bad. (Another just had to seal off their guest room...)

NY Times: Move Over, Bedbugs: Stink Bugs Have Landed

Stink bug invaders cause uproar for Baltimore County homeowners

Pinch - I'm right there with you. We have a soybean field just behind our backyard. Our new construction area of the house is absolutely filled with asian beetles - and some boxelder bugs. But you know, we had an infestation that went on quite some time a while back, and I tried a bunch of traps, etc. I finally got rid of them - but the method was rather "old fashioned" - I literally took the time to squish each and every one of them as soon as I saw them. If you have buzillions, I'd recommend starting with a good vacuuming to get rid of the majority, and then from that moment on, just kill them one-by-one. If you don't kill them right away, they do just as you indicated - crawl into some space in your house, hibernate, wake up, hatch buzzillions of new beetles, and you're back to square one.

Now if you ever need a real trap for fruit flies, let me know - that I actually have a "trap" method for.

Good luck - and remember, I'm right there with you!
AP

We also have the Asian beetles (the ones that look a lot like ladybugs) but so far they've been nowhere near the problem of these stink bugs! I hope we aren't in for a nasty surprise this winter with those as well! (We've always had a few here & there, especially in our MBA, but not that bad.)

analysisparalysis - Bring it on! I hope it's better than the vinegar in a bottle. My flies are smarter than that.

buehl, I forgot you were in stink bug country. You win.

Got you beat - we have stink bugs at home and in my children's school, lice is going around and around and around!!

Well, actually, it is...but apple cider vinegar, not white...and you have to tape a paper funnel on the jar with an opening just big enough for them to crawl through. Our fruit flies are dumb enough to be stuck at that point - they can't find their way out. Guess I'm lucky on that one!

Sorry I wasn't help with that either. I think I'll surrender on the exterminator ideas tonight... :-)

Ok if we're talking about those brown beetles that look like lady bugs but aren't, and stink when you touch/kill them, they're here in WV too. I used to be plagued with them all winter until I started having a guy come and spray for them every August/Sept. Now I have none! I only see them lying dead on the porch floor/around doors and windows. I still have to sweep them up but at least they're DEAD! No more laying on the couch and watching them fly around the lights above me.

Seriously - an exterminator needs to spray around your house and windows etc and then no more stinky brown lady bug beetles whatever the H*ll they are!!

I'm afraid to spray.... my cats, dogs and chickens lay in front of the doors.....and anywhere else they choose. If only the darn things were yummy, I wouldn't have any. Chicken patrol!

No, stink bugs don't look anything like lady bugs...here's a picture I took of one on our deck...

Spraying doesn't do any good...you get the first herd and another shows up the next day. I killed hundreds on our deck the other day w/water & detergent (probably more), and the next day they were just as thick as the day before. (I had opened our cushion shed on the deck and they were massed on the cushions, b/w the cushions, and on the walls of the shed...so I just flooded everything w/gallon upon gallon of water & dish detergent...they died w/in seconds.)

buehl, we have those too. Knock on wood, not as plentiful as you. The bugs are winning.

I'm sure glad to know I'm not alone. I have both. I'm in central Maryland. I've had the ladybugs for years, my upstairs corner bedroom and bathroom fill up in the fall and spring - both rooms get the afternoon sun and the bugs swarm outside and then find their way in somehow. I covered the windows with plastic this fall, we'll see what happens.

Now I have the stink bugs, all around the outside of my house, so far, not too many have gotten in, but I'm not optimistic. Some of my neighbors, who don't have the ladybugs have the stink bugs everywhere. It's just awful and there doesn't seem to be a good solution to either problem.

Good luck.

I live in California, so I haven't had the problem YET. What do they eat? Can you mix some boric acid with their food? Can you spray a boric acid solution around the house to kill them? Works on ants and roaches.

I'm in rural northeast MD. We've got both stinkbugs which left their smell on my raspberries and Mexican bean beetles (adults are reddish like ladybugs but juveniles are yellow with spots) that plagued every other plant. The pumpkin plants were also infested with some other beetle that looked like an elongated stink bug. Ironically, very few Japanese beetles this year.

We've got both fruit flies and stink bugs here in NJ. No answer for the stink bugs yet - just a few in my house that I have been vacuuming. BUT for the fruit flies if you do a mix of mostly apple cider vinegar and two or three squirts of liquid dish detergent in a plastic cup filled pretty high with nothing covering it that has been killing about three dozen or so a day for us and I change out the mixture pretty much every night. Good luck getting rid of your bugs!

i live in upstate ny and have the asian beetles (ladybugs) too. just started seeing them about 2 days ago. they hibernate IN my house all winter long, it's revolting but there's nothing to do except vacuum them up!

allnewappliances YOU are the new winner. But buehl is right on your heels! Lice gives me the creeps. Bugs just annoy me. I'm waiting for a good hard freeze. and then it should warm up agian for about 3 months, cool down to 40 or so and then summer by May: 85 with a south breeze! None of that is going to happen......other than the hard freeze but I say if you are going to waste time dreaming, make it a good dream. Remind me in December that the cold is taking care of the bugs.

1991 was box elder beetle year. 2000 was ladybugs (they reappeared in 2008) I guess it was 2006(?) for the cicadas, and they had a good summer run this year as well. Now stink bugs! What's next, assassin beetles?
It was 80+ today and they were crawling all over in a frenzy.
Come to think of it, I haven't seen a toad in at least 10 years, the baby ones used to be all over.
Casey

I have toads! Loads of them. It was hard mowing and not running over them. I think they duck though. I even have them in my basement and happy to have them there. This is the year for tree frogs. Now that I think about it, there weren't so many black picnic bugs....or I didn't notice? No picnics to speak of this year so maybe that explains it.

Asian ladybugs are in fact real ladybugs and were imported to eat crop pest insects. Doesn't help you get rid of them. But the poor things are always getting downgraded just because they mistake houses for a nice place to hibernate. They are GOOD insects...until they get inside...

someone2010...they eat just about anything we grow as crops...corn, soybean, apples, tomatoes, cherries, berries, etc. They're pretty indiscriminate.

Fori...the ladybugs don't bother me, nor do crickets or most spiders (the giant wolf spiders are the exception!) For some reason, though, the stink bugs creep me out! I was watching TV last night and thought I saw a piece of lint on the blanket I was using. I absentmindedly picked it up and it moved! Yikes! I put it in the cup of soapy water I've begun keeping available and then washed my now-smelly fingers! I went back downstairs to take care of laundry, and when I came back upstairs I smelled stink bug...all from that one bug!

I found 3 more in the MBA today in the skylight well-I sweeped them into the cup (yes one upstairs as well!) and then I flushed them...no smell!!!

buehl..I think your nasty looking insect is a bee assassin. They are beneficial for killing unwanted insects, but can cause painful bites. You may want to google it.

It's a "brown marmorated stink bug".

ok and just to throw something else out there, along with my stink bugs (although we don't have them bad at all), lice going around the school...but we also have BIG spider crickets (also known as cave crickets)....if you have ever had those, I think all other bugs are minor in comparison.
If you don't know what they are, google them. They are supposedly blind, so instead of crawling or jumping away, they jump towards you.

Oh yuck, beuhl. You're making me feel very fortunate - I don't seem to be able to smell them. Very thankful as we also have tons of them.

We used to get hundreds of the asian ladybugs indoors, but they haven't been a problem inside since we redid the windows and doors. The stink bugs come through the edges of the screens in in through the mechanisms of the casement windows when they're open. They creep me out.

I am in Iowa and have the asian beetle problem too, although not I am not getting them in the house this year like I have in previous years. This is what I do. I spray the exterior of the house with ortho home defense (it is one that can be used inside too, so I also spray it in the basement). Our pets lay on our deck, so I don't spray that area. I have a friend that does organic farming and they say that if you spread diatomaceous earth around your house it will kill them after they crawl through it, and it is completely nontoxic. It will kill any hard shelled bug actually. When we built on last year I put diatomaceous earth in the walls before they put the sheet rock on. I have only had a couple of beetles get in the house, but there are tons outside. I do have those darn fruit flies and have been using the cider vinegar method for several days. Have gotten rid of most of them. We also have a massive amount of toads outside, and I found a tree frog in the house last week. Still not sure how that got in. Found it in the foyer. Scared the crap out of me. LOL The only real bug I have in the house this year is millipedes. Or atleast I think that is what they are (little tiny worms that curl up if you touch them?) They are in our basement, although they die rather quickly probably from crawling thru the ortho. We had them 10 years a go in the basement when we moved here and never again til this year. Must be a good year for them? Yuck!

kristine_2009, where did you buy your diatomaceous earth? The last one I got was 50# but the shipping added too much to the price to do it often. that was food grade so that I could use it in the critter food for deworming. did you use food grade or pool grade? I'm near Mason City.

Do you think I could spray enough ortho home defense on the side of the house, especially around windows? I don't want to do the ground. Maybe put food grade D.E. on the dirt.

Last year when we were remodeling when they took off the old siding there were millions of the asian beetles underneath. It was disgusting. I sprayed the sides of the houses as far up as I could get standing on the ground. The ortho sprays a fine mist and a little goes a long way. I bought the gallon size that comes with the pump type sprayer and have been using that same gallon for several years. So yes, I think you could get enough on the side of the house. I didn't spray the ground either because of the kids and animals. Put the DE around the house. It should cut down on them substantially. They are combining east and west of my house today. Curious to see if I am going to get inundated with them soon!
I bought my food grade DE online. I shopped around and figured price per pound with shipping figured in. This place I linked below had the best price last year. I bought a 10# bag for $25 and have a lot left over. I too thought of using it as wormer for the outside cats but haven't tried it yet. Not sure if the local farm stores carry it. I guess I never really checked. Maybe call the feed stores. They might have it or somewhere like Theisens/Tractor Supply? But I didn't think $2.50 a pound was too bad. It is a fine dust so it goes a long way as well. I will email my "organic" friend and see where she buys her DE.
Hope that helps Pinch! When those beetles invade it is awful!

Here is a link that might be useful: Diatomaceous earth