'Gross!': Millions of moths invade New Brunswick town
Postmedia Network and The Canadian Press
First posted: Thursday, July 28, 2016 04:33 PM EDT | Updated: Thursday, July 28, 2016 04:36 PM EDT
DALHOUSIE, N.B. -- Like something out of a horror movie, millions of moths overran the Campbellton-Dalhousie area of New Brunswick towns last weekend.
The swarms were so thick "you'd have to push your way through with your hands to get them out of your face," said Dawn Kenny of the Stewart House bed and breakfast in Dalhousie. "It was gross! ... I have never seen anything like that in my life."
The spruce budworm moths, each about the size of a fingernail, blanketed pavement, cars and people, and they frightened guests of Kenny's bed and breakfast.
"When people saw the moths they'd kind of panic and run out and leave the door open, so they came into the house," she said.
It took two days to clean the house and "vacuum them out."
"They stick on the walls and you have to vacuum them or if you touch them at all they squish and they're black in colour. We had to wash all the walls."
Ecologists blame the warm weather for a mass migration of the moths, that were likely carried on an updraft from hundreds of kilometres away.
As quickly as they invaded, the moths left.
"There were some around (the next day)," Kenny said, "but very few, just stuck on your windows and screens, but the majority of them were gone."
A sudden infestation of spruce budworm moths swarmed northern New Brunswick last weekend, leaving people in Campbellton and Dalhousie with stories to tell, and a mess to clean up. A pile of budworm moths are seen on the ground under a tree in Campbellton, N.B., in a July 25th, 2016, handout photo. (THE CANADIAN PRESS/HO-Emily Owens, Natural Resources Canada)
'Gross!': Millions of moths invade New Brunswick town | Canada | News | Toronto
Postmedia Network and The Canadian Press
First posted: Thursday, July 28, 2016 04:33 PM EDT | Updated: Thursday, July 28, 2016 04:36 PM EDT
DALHOUSIE, N.B. -- Like something out of a horror movie, millions of moths overran the Campbellton-Dalhousie area of New Brunswick towns last weekend.
The swarms were so thick "you'd have to push your way through with your hands to get them out of your face," said Dawn Kenny of the Stewart House bed and breakfast in Dalhousie. "It was gross! ... I have never seen anything like that in my life."
The spruce budworm moths, each about the size of a fingernail, blanketed pavement, cars and people, and they frightened guests of Kenny's bed and breakfast.
"When people saw the moths they'd kind of panic and run out and leave the door open, so they came into the house," she said.
It took two days to clean the house and "vacuum them out."
"They stick on the walls and you have to vacuum them or if you touch them at all they squish and they're black in colour. We had to wash all the walls."
Ecologists blame the warm weather for a mass migration of the moths, that were likely carried on an updraft from hundreds of kilometres away.
As quickly as they invaded, the moths left.
"There were some around (the next day)," Kenny said, "but very few, just stuck on your windows and screens, but the majority of them were gone."
A sudden infestation of spruce budworm moths swarmed northern New Brunswick last weekend, leaving people in Campbellton and Dalhousie with stories to tell, and a mess to clean up. A pile of budworm moths are seen on the ground under a tree in Campbellton, N.B., in a July 25th, 2016, handout photo. (THE CANADIAN PRESS/HO-Emily Owens, Natural Resources Canada)
'Gross!': Millions of moths invade New Brunswick town | Canada | News | Toronto
