Saskatoon property 'crawls' with swarms of maple bugs

Bob Muckalt rarely had to deal with maple bugs before he and his wife Rita bought their home in Confederation Park in 2021.

Now, his front yard, his driveway and the front of his home are covered red with the nuisance insect every day in the spring and summer.

"I have killed literally millions of these bugs," Muckalt said. "And I just come in scratching my head each day wondering — I'm not even making a dent in them."

The boxelder bug, more commonly known as a maple bug, tends to thrive in dry, warm weather. The drier the weather, the greater the population.

With Saskatoon in the midst of multiple years of drought, maple bugs are becoming an even greater problem, to the point where Muckalt took his concerns to the city's standing policy committee on environment, utilities and corporate services last week.

"The sidewalk crawls, our driveway crawls, our house crawls," he said to the committee. "It's beyond anything I've ever experienced before in my life."

Compounding the problem for Muckalt is the female maple tree on his front lawn, but the tree is on the city's side of the property. Female maple trees produce more seeds when stressed by dry conditions, which attracts millions of maple bugs who feast on the seeds.

Maple bugs thrive in warmth. When they're not near the tree, they’re usually clustered on warm surfaces.

Konrad Andre, operations manager in Saskatoon’s parks department, said the city stopped planting female maple trees in 2007, partly because of the issues they caused.

Andre says the city receives about 20 calls per year about maple bugs. With no service requirement for maple bugs, the city focuses its efforts on education.

Make sure the house is sealed, use a mixture of dish soap and water to spray and kill the bugs and make sure the tree is watered — a routine that Muckalt has spent hundreds of hours on since he bought the home.

"I don't know what the appropriate word would be for the level of frustration, but it's untenable," he said.

The city won't offer much help beyond education.

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"The main information we provide is about minimizing and sort of trying to address them ... and then as we hopefully get out of the drought cycle, hopefully the maple bugs will be reduced," Andre said.

The Muckalts have run out of patience. They are unable to spend any time in their front yard or even undertake basic property maintenance like painting the front of their home.

"I'm out here at least 10 times a day, probably 15 minutes each spraying, and I kill literally hundreds of thousands of them and I come out an hour later and there's more than when I started," Muckalt said.

After three years of problems, the Muckalts have come to one determination — the tree must go.

They say they’re willing to split the costs with the city, but their request was denied by Andre and his department.

"Under our tree bylaw and the trees on city property policy, removing a tree for insects would not be allowed," Andre said.

Now, Muckalt regrets informing the city. By going through the proper channels, the city is now aware of the tree it refuses to take down. Unlawfully removing the tree would mean an initial fine of up to $10,000 and the potential of other costs being passed on to Muckalt.

"I cannot understand why a tree that is causing the entire issue is more important than the well being of ourselves and our neighbors. That doesn't compute with me," he said.

With nowhere else to turn, and seemingly stuck with a problematic tree that's not on his property yet he's responsible for taking care of, Muckalt is pondering leaving the city altogether.

"If I had received complaints like this in my previous profession, and had treated the complaints the way the city has treated me I should have been fired because it shows an absolute lack of regard for anybody's feelings," he said.

"We're sort of caught between a rock and a hard place and it's a horrible place to be because common sense somewhere has to prevail, but it certainly isn't yet."