5 Pests that Love to Sip Our Beverages

5 Pests that Love to Sip Our Beverages

Nothing hits the spot quite like a delicious drink. The daily battle to drink the correct amount of water is a common goal that many people apply their best efforts to try and reach. It is made even more difficult with the presence of so many other beverages that are infinitely more exciting than plain water. Sweet lemonades, fizzy sodas, rejuvenating coffees, or fun adult beverages are enjoyable treats that make any day a bit better. This is the whole reasoning behind National Beverage Day, which you can celebrate this Saturday, May 6! Unfortunately, we are not the only species to enjoy sweet drinks. Many insects are so attracted to these types of beverages that they will follow the scent trail straight to the source, which is why you may find tiny bugs taking a swim in your uncovered cup. Let’s look into the reasons why certain insects like enjoyable beverages, as well as five frequent visitors of any drink left unattended at a party. 

The Main Attraction

Most of the common visitors of a sweet drink are drawn to it for similar reasons. Flying insects in particular can detect odors in various ways, which is how they are able to find our food and drinks so easily. Their scent receptors are pretty strong, allowing them to track food sources from a good distance. One of the reasons why flying insects sometimes seem to have such an erratic flight patten is because they will make sharp turns when tracking a scent to the source. Alcohol, soda, and fruity drinks are the strongest-smelling beverages, so they are often sought out by hungry pests. They prefer food sources that are not frequently visited by anything larger than them, and this translates to drinks as well. Insects will settle for any amount of beverage leftovers, such as spills, leftover soda syrup bags, empty cans, and messy soda machines. If you take away anything from this blog, let it be this: don’t use an open punch bowl at an outdoor party. If insects will crawl into a can with a few drops of soda, a beverage of this size would be paradise for them!

Fruit Flies

With the number of fruity drinks on the market, it makes sense why fruit flies are constantly found in open drink containers. They need to consume everything in liquid form that will fit within their spongy mouths, which is why they will regurgitate solid food before being able to consume it. Fruit flies are famously drawn to overripe fruit because the bruised surface allows yeast to attach itself to the sugar in the fruit and eventually ferment, giving the fruit fly their ideal food source. Because of this natural attraction, fruit flies love sugary drinks. Their scent receptors detect the chemicals that give manufactured drinks their sweetness. Fruit flies are attracted to alcohol and soda the most because of the fermentation in the alcohol and the sugar in the soda, along with one other key component: carbonation.

Imagine a glass of soda sitting out on the patio table: it is inevitable that a nosy fruit fly will eventually find its way into that soda because it has many attractive qualities for a tiny fly. For one, the sugar content is often high enough for the fruit fly to detect and track it through their scent receptors. But the carbonation is also quite appealing to them, as the fizziness of these beverages is sought after by the fruit flies whether the drink is flavored or not. The fermentation in alcohol is understandably the most attractive for fruit flies, and they are particularly fond of wine. These flies can actually taste their food, so they will be tempted to drink as much as possible from a can or a small spill. But even fruit flies need to greatly limit themselves on alcohol: they can pass out if they drink too much!

Cockroaches

Roaches have a great sense of smell, which seems ironic considering how much time they like to spend in sewers and garbage dumps. This ability is how cockroaches can easily find our food and drinks while leaving pheromones for their family to follow to the same source. Drinks with any amount of sweetness will appeal to roaches because sugar is potentially their greatest attractor when scavenging for food. They will settle for any amount of leftover liquid, and are often found near spills and cans with just a few drops left. Roaches are not very picky, especially since their cold-blooded anatomy allows them to live without food for a while. 

There are two primary drinks that roaches enjoy above all: beer and coffee (an interesting combo). It is actually a well-known fact among brewers that cockroaches are a prominent beer pest. They love beer for the sugar and hops, and will be happy to enjoy even a small taste of this beverage. Just like humans, roaches also like the energy that coffee gives them. It provides them with enough substantial nutrition, so roaches don’t have to eat for a while after they sip some coffee. Since these pests can even smell liquids that have been sitting out for quite a while, it is essential to clean any spills as soon as possible. 

Mosquitos

As if mosquitos weren’t already a frustrating problem, it turns out that our drink of choice has a major influence on bloodthirsty mosquitos. This principle is seen most clearly at an outdoor gathering in warmer weather, where people are talking and drinking some kind of (possibly alcoholic) beverage. Mosquitos have infrared vision, which is how they are able to differentiate mammals from cold-blooded creatures. They are mainly attracted to humans in the summer because that is when we give off the most heat, moisture, and carbon dioxide, all of which attract mosquitos. However, only female mosquitos seek out warm blood once they need protein for their eggs. So these mosquito mothers are the ones to blame for those itchy bites, which they are apparently more likely to do with alcohol in our systems.

Both male and female mosquitos like fermented fruit and are drawn to any opened beverages, so it makes sense that they would be more likely to swoop in for a taste of beer or wine. The ethanol content is an attractive component for these pests, whose senses are so fine-tuned that they are even drawn to the slight alcohol content in the sweat of someone who’s been drinking. There have been studies done on the phenomenon of mosquitos liking blood containing alcohol even more, despite the minimal amount that they actually ingest. It seems that they are more likely to bite someone who has had more to drink since the pests love the taste of alcohol. The jury is still out on whether or not mosquitos can feel the effects of alcohol to the point of getting drunk. Since the blood-alcohol level is low in the small amount they consume, it doesn’t seem likely that mosquitos will feel a buzz from their blood-centric meal. 

Stinging Insects

This may be the most popular category of pests that can be found in our drinks. Who hasn’t been holding an open cup containing a fruity drink, only for a striped insect to buzz around the rim? Wasps and yellow jackets are the most common, but bees will also enjoy a sweet beverage when they’re in the area. All of these pests are eusocial, meaning their home is a colony comprised of a queen and hundreds of workers. These worker insects forage for food that will sustain the group, and they all have a major sweet tooth. Their natural preference is for nectar and fruits, but stinging insects also love sodas and desserts. Yellow jackets are the most aggressive species that will sting anyone who gets too close, including when the pests are searching for food.

It may not seem like there are a ton of stinging insects right now, but the queen of each colony is constantly laying eggs that will hatch a few days later. This means that there can be about 1,000 workers by the end of summer, which gives them the responsibility of gathering enough food to sustain them all. Yellow jackets prefer carbs and protein for their larvae, but all general stinging species seek out sweets for the bursts of energy. In addition to fruit juices and drinks, stinging pests love soda. They like both actual sugar and high fructose corn syrup, as either one will be enough to give their colonies energy. All stinging insects can bring the liquids back to their nests in a functional way, but bees have a particularly interesting method. They will store the soda in the section of their stomach that is normally reserved for honey ingredients, which makes it easy for them to regurgitate it in the hive for their fellow workers to enjoy later. 

Ants

It may be impossible to get through a food-centric blog without mentioning ants, as they are the epitome of an invasive food-stealing pest. Worker ants are also responsible for gathering food for their colony, and they favor both sugar and carbs for the energy these ingredients give. Any kind of sugary beverage is appealing to ants, especially soda and fruity drinks. The sugar has the added benefit of helping them to create natural antibiotics that will keep them safe from diseases. Ants are more aggressive after consuming sugar, versus carbohydrates, since the spike in energy is a lot for their tiny bodies. Soda in particular comes with a couple of caveats, so the type of pop actually makes a difference to the ants.

People have their preferences between regular and diet colas, and ants are not exempt from these debates. Ants are not even attracted to diet sodas, despite the fact that they smell similar to regular sodas. The sugar-free sweeteners in diet colas don’t give ants energy, so they want nothing to do with the drink. It is just as well for the ants, since it is thought that diet sodas would dehydrate the ants and potentially be detrimental to their health. However, their love for regular sodas may be even worse for their health, as many gardeners actually use Coke as a DIY pest control method! The sugar may be irresistible to ants, but the levels of caffeine, acidity, and chemicals in a regular soda are fatal to the insects in larger doses. The people who use regular cola in this way recommend using a spray bottle to disperse it over the plants, as it will drive away the ants that farm aphids and mealybugs. 

Pointe Pest Control is a Sweet Victory

Whether you’re enjoying a strawberry lemonade or a refreshing soda pop, the one ingredient that is never welcome in these beverages is any kind of pest. They carry harmful bacteria and pathogens and will not leave a reliable food source willingly – not to mention the fact that a bug in your drink is just gross! No matter what kinds of pests you see around your home and yard this spring, Pointe Pest Control is happy to help. We provide effective treatments for dozens of pest species by using both preventative and responsive measures against each specific issue. Contact us for more information on how our environmentally-friendly services will keep the pests away from the sweet treats you’re enjoying this season! 

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