In the winter, freezing conditions can freeze stink bugs to death. Does this mean that they are all gone? Not likely.
In laboratory tests, stink bugs create a natural anti-freeze that helps to keep the water in their bodies from crystallizing and killing them. The biggest difference is that in the lab tests, the bugs aren’t frozen for months the way that the weather has been recently.
Nonetheless, not all of the stink bugs will die. They like to hide under shingles, in attics and in walls. For at least some of them that will be enough to keep them alive and able to procreate. And procreating is something that stink bugs do very well.
Virginia Tech. entomology professor Thomas Kuhar tested the winter theory by gathering up stink bugs and putting them into 5-gallon buckets. Over the course of a winter, 95% of the bugs died. The buckets were filled with foam insulation and keep under a shelter for the season. The bugs create cryoprotectants, antifreeze proteins, help to keep the bugs bodily fluids from crystallizing. Proteins similar to these can be found in arctic creatures that survive the even longer, even colder winter in extreme climates. Ninety-five percent might seem like a lot but it only takes a couple of bugs to make a whole colony in no time.
The only real solution to keeping stink bugs away from the home is to choose a good exterminator who will find the bus where they hide and keep them away. Anchor Pest Control will use the latest scientific solutions to keep stink bugs away, all without negatively affecting the family and pets in the area.