Bug-A-Salt 3.0 Review

If you’ve experienced the invasive spotted lanternfly blight of the Northeast, you know just how bad an insect infestation can get. Imagine your treasured garden is totally infested with bugs, then someone hands you a plastic pump shotgun that’s perfectly calibrated to blow away invasives, shooting them with table salt and killing them instantly. The gun is called Bug-A-Salt 3.0 (available at Amazon) —it’s a real thing—and I tested it out on spotted lanternflies to see whether it lives up to claims.

Bug-A-Salt 3.0 blasts small bugs into the gravel. It’s a targeted approach that doesn’t risk killing the non-harmful insects that could fall prey to traps and poison. Sounds humane, right? Except the model I tested wasn’t actually powerful enough to kill adult lanternflies outright. Rather, it punched holes through their wings and bodies—even after two shots—presumably leaving them to die of salt desiccation. After failing a couple of kills, I stopped shooting bugs, and recommend you probably do, too. There is an argument in favor of this gun. However, the whole experience begs the question: Is it humane to use pest control that turns killing into a sport?

About the Bug-A-Salt gun

The Bug-A-Salt 3.0 is a spring-powered salt cannon calibrated to kill insects. It launches standard table salt at velocities that will kill bugs outright and potentially kill them with salt poisoning if it doesn’t get them on the first shot.

The version of the gun that I tested comes in yellow and black, with orange detailing on the tip, trigger, and safety.

Salt is loaded into the gun through a port on the top, which funnels it down into the mechanism. This port is covered in a clear hatch that snaps closed.

The gun has a partridge sight on top. The rear part of the sight springs from the body when cocked. A push safety on the rear handle stops the gun from firing. The gun cocks and fires like a pump shotgun.

On their website, Bug-A-Salt recommends the 3.0 for houseflies, mosquitos, pest/poisonous spiders, small to large roaches (though not extra large roaches), lanternflies, cabbage worms, earwigs, and moths.

They say that it is only to be used by people over the age of 18, wearing protective goggles.

How we tested the Bug-A-Salt 3.0

We tested the Bug-A-Salt 3.0 on adult spotted lanternflies on a humid July afternoon in the backyard of a local coffee shop. This particular coffee shop has a wild grapevine behind it that has historically borne crops of delicious grapes. Then, in 2023, when the lanternfly infestation was at its most severe, the vine ceased to bear fruit. With at least one tree of heaven nearby, the location is a natural hub for spotted lanternflies.

In this location, with a blessing from staff, I went after the shop was closed, and tested the Bug-A-Salt gun on adult lanternflies in the backyard.

Earlier in the summer, I tested the Bug-A-Salt 3.0 in a patch of woods, where I found a few early instar spotted lanternfly nymphs.

What we like

This gun blows young lanternflies away

In my first test run, I found a tree of heaven with numerous early instar spotted lanternfly nymphs. I loaded the gun with a thicker-grade table salt. A hit from the Bug-A-Salt gun effectively deleted these young bugs. Where before there were lanternflies, now there were only the tell-tale perforations where the salt ripped through the leaf.

This is the use case where this gun is effective. An arborist who finds a burgeoning infestation of early instar lanternflies could use this to effectively wipe the bugs out before they grow large enough to produce young.

Presumably, the gun would be similarly effective with German cockroaches or small, dangerous spiders. If you have an infestation of brown recluses or black widows in a house with a child, this gun could be effective.

Whatever you use it on, consider all alternatives before resorting to killing bugs or animals.

It doesn’t risk bycatch and won’t poison other bugs

Entomologists recommend circle traps and adhesive traps for eliminating spotted lanternflies. One is an adhesive trap. If improperly set up, adhesive traps risk killing all manner of wildlife, from other tree-climbing insects to birds, who can swoop down to eat trapped insects and become stuck themselves.

The Bug-A-Salt 3.0 eliminates the risk of killing birds and other types of bugs because, for better or worse, you’re the one pulling the trigger. Effectively, you are responsible for which bugs die.

Native bugs are so important to my environment. Bug populations are decreasing at staggering rates globally. While the Bug-A-Salt gun probably won’t do enough to stop a full spotted lanternfly infestation, it also won’t kill all the other good bugs in the area.

It’s accurate enough, especially with spread

When I wasn’t shooting spotted lanternflies, I tested the Bug-A-Salt 3.0 out on leaves and sticks.

The gun hits the mark, so long as you aim it well. Don’t expect this to pick off a bug from meters away, but it's accurate from about three or four feet (a football field by insect standards). That said, I wouldn’t expect it to be accurate for much more than six feet.

The gun’s spread helps with any aim problems you might have. This thing uses salt like birdshot. When shooting from a few feet away, the salt spread was about two to three inches wide.

What we don’t like

It couldn’t kill an adult lanternfly in one shot

The Bug-A-Salt 3.0 was not powerful enough to kill adult lanternflies. Instead, it just shot holes through them. Even after a second point-blank shot, they continued to crawl around torturously.

With table salt blasted through their bodies like buckshot, they presumably died, but it wasn’t instantaneous. Lanternflies take a real toll on plant life; even so, it was awful watching them twitch as they slowly died from salt poisoning and piercing lacerations.

We take no pleasure in killing insects. This gun felt more like a torture device than an effective tool for culling invasives. Because of this, I can’t recommend it.

Should bug killing really be turned into a sport?

We talked to Brian Eshenaur, an entomologist at Cornell and the NYS Integrated Pest Management program, about the best way to stop invasive lanternflies. He seemed to balk when I asked him about using a Bug-A-Salt gun. “Then it might be sport.”

“Is that going to affect the overall population? Maybe slightly. But it's not going to eradicate them.”

We get it. Bug-A-Salt makes hunting insects into a game.

Do I feel good about the whole thing? Not really.

It’s not that safe—especially for kids

Bug-A-Salt 3.0 looks like a standard-issue squirt gun. But don’t make a mistake and bring this salt cannon to a super-soaker fight.

Bug-A-Salt comes right out and says that you should always wear protective glasses when you use the gun. They also warn not to use this on animals or people.

With its bright yellow trim and orange detailing I can see how mistakes could get made. To a pet or a wild bird, a shot from this would be torturous. A human eye would be damaged for life.

If you’ve got kids in the house, be extremely careful with this gun. It could blind your kids, their friends, or your cat—for life.

Should you buy the Bug-A-Salt 3.0?

No, it may have its uses, but it’s not reliable

Bug-A-Salt 3.0 failed as the targeted lanternfly execution weapon I hoped it would be. After shooting a few spotted lanternflies and watching them twitch as they slowly died of their wounds, I won’t be using the Bug-A-Salt gun on live insects again.

Even if you use it for lanternfly nymphs, where it was effective, Bug-A-Salt probably isn’t going to turn the tide if you’re up against full-blown infestations. That said, it could make a difference against an infestation of young lanternflies, medically significant spiders like brown recluses, or tiny German cockroaches.

For regular people, Bug-A-Salt turns insect hunting into a sport. I can’t tell you how to feel about that. If you get it, please keep your killing spree to real pests and be careful.