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Visited my parents in Phoenix last April and practically lived outside on their patio, ate every dinner outside. No flies, no bees, no mosquitoes or gnats. It's too dry for them to ever survive.
In my mind, "pests" are bugs or rodents that do damage to one's property and especially one's home. There is no place without bugs, and that's as it should be (although personally, I'd happily live without them).
NYC has horrible pests that infest one's home and spread disease (cockroaches, rats). I've seen maybe five cockroaches since leaving NYC in '73 and those were in/near restaurants in SF, CA. My experience living in the Bay Area (SF city, Marin County, Contra Costa county) was that there weren't that many bugs and I never had an infestation of anything. Lots of nice bugs too... beautiful butterflies and lots of honey bees.
Spiders, in my mind, do not qualify as pests because they feed on other bugs. Black widows and brown recluse spiders are another story, of course. We had a lot of black widows in SoCal (San Diego county) and probably brown recluse too though never saw one. In fact, the area I lived in down there (Jamul, about 2000 feet above sea level, mostly oak and brush) had more insects and rodents to last me a few life times: spiders of all sorts, tarantulas, scorpions, something called the "kissing bug" which was a beetle that was basically a large bedbug and whose bite gave me welts and sent another person to the ER via helicopter! We had rats and mice and ground squirrels that left our 10-acres pockmarked with ankle-twisting holes. Biting red ants and wasps 1/2 foot long. Not many mosquitos though, since it was so arid. For me, however, the area was a living nightmare! Just for that reason alone I'd never live there again, although I have a good dozen other reasons not to, as well.
San Clemente wasn't too bad... except for Argentine ants. EVERYWHERE! That town --I think all of SoCal-- is basically one large colony of black ants and there is no way of eliminating them. You control them, if you're lucky.
Here along the coast of Southern Oregon, my home is basically bug free. I recently saw a couple of silver fish which is worrisome (I have 2500-book library), but I've never lived anywhere that has been totally free of those things. Lots of spiders too, but less now that I've been dusting the crawl space. Fleas, of course... but those are very controllable.
Unfortunately, the use of chemicals/pesticides to rid our environment of so-called 'pests' is hurting us more than the pests themselves would hurt us if left alone or dealt with on a bug-by-bug basis.
Black widows and brown recluse spiders are another story, of course. We had a lot of black widows in SoCal (San Diego county) and probably brown recluse too though never saw one.
I think all of SoCal-- is basically one large colony of black ants and there is no way of eliminating them. .
Have to agree...SO Cal has a MAJOR ANT problem, and when it heats up here in the Inland Empire, lots of wasps and yes, I've seen many black widow spiders. BUT NO MOSQUITOS LOTS OF LIZARDS!
Upstate NY hasn't got any real pests although Lyme Disease carrying ticks seem to be on the rise.
In late spring and early summer there are tent caterpillars which can get disgusting if you are in an area with a large infestation. They fall out of trees, poop on everything, and climb on everything. Then in June they turn into moths and go away.
I am from Oregon and I can tell you that it is not pest-free by any means (as others have also pointed out)!
The wetter NW corner/Willamette Valley has a ****TON**** of spiders, including the poisonous Brown Recluse or "Brown Fiddle" as we called them. There are also a lot of silverfish, earwigs (or "pincher bugs"), spidermites, ants (including carpenter ants), wasps, etc. and slugs of all shapes and sizes - including the great Banana Slug which are sometimes as big as bananas. Now slugs aren't bugs but they are definitely "pests" to gardeners! I have lived and worked in a few older buildings in Portland that also had roaches - granted, not the same size or nearly the same scale that you will find in larger and older cities like NYC or warmer climates like SoCal, but impossible to totally get rid of nevertheless.
East of the Cascades in Oregon has rattlesnakes. Southern Oregon has Black Widows. I lived in Ashland and had them ALL OVER my apartment - outside, not inside, luckily! They also get swarms of praying mantises (as witnessed twice by me when I lived there). Also many box-elder bugs in Ashland.
So, the Pacific NW is not "pest-free" by any means. In fact, I'd say that where I live right now in SW Ohio is the most bug and pest-free place I've ever lived or visited.
I;ve always found that the ural area have natural pest problems and the rban more like rats etc.
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