Jul
Tropical Life
How to Kill Mosquitoes
My routine of checking this mornings email turned into a full blown blog post – Thanks to Jay.
Hey TG, here’s another one to add to your mosquito trap that I sent to you last year. It sounds as tho if everyone on the island would buy a bottle of Listerine and make a trap, you could eliminate all of those pesky creatures on the island. Wouldn’t that be nice? I hope all is well in the land of sunshine and sand. Aloha from Thailand, J
First thing I do when I get info like this is go to my best friend Google [actually my toolbar got switched to Bing no idea how]. I ran a search on ‘does Listerine kill mosquitoes’ and here are 3 interesting things I found.
1. Nice thought but just as I suspected snopes gave a false right away to this email chain. According to them it is the female mosquitoes we need to worry about and the reason is that they are attracted to carbon dioxide. The more a person emits the more likely they are to be under attack by the female blood suckers. Mosquito repellants like Deet and picardin work not so much for the kill factor but because they jam the odor receptors in insect antennae and mask odors that would ordinarily attract the bloodsucking bugs.
2. A Florida resident explains a bit about the theory behind the possibility of using mouthwash as insecticide. Since Listerine contains a fair amount of alcohol, spraying it directly onto mosquitoes will likely kill them, but not very efficiently. The alcohol could kill either by excessive intoxication, dehydration, or the fact that an alcohol solution has lower surface tension than water, which could wick through an insect’s spiracles into the trachea and drown them. [Death by Alcohol – unfortunately not the first time I have seen this idea come to pass.]
3. Best voted answer on Yahoo answers.
How would you go about killing mosquitoes with Listerine?
Spit it on them in mid-flight? lol
Here are my favorite tried and true ways to help keep the pesky buggers away?
Inside the house Vape wins hands down for me. You can find the plug-in device and boxes of replaceable cartridges known as Vape Mats in many grocery stores here on Ambergris Caye.
Vape Mat is easy to use and lasts up to 12 hours. Each mat has three holes in it which slowly releases the insecticide when plugged in. Its time to use a new mat when you notice a color change from blue to white. In addition to skeeters it works a charm on pesky no-see-um’s when they are bad enough be unwanted house guests.
The only drawback is that you have to pay attention as it is a plug in device. Not sure what happens if you leave it plugged in over 12 h without changing the mat and not looking to find out.
Mosquito coils are great too and I sometimes burn them outside on our veranda to help keep them at bay. If skeeters are really bad I will spray the screen door with bug stuff.
p.s I have been meaning to give totals on our last few BEL electric bills – April $83.06 – May $94.31 – June $105.59 – prices are in Belize dollars. We do not use air con and sometimes have ceiling fans going. Our main power use is computers, lights, tv and electric stove. I am determined to get it down a bit more since I learned that our friends who live in a condo close by come in around the $60 range – missing the days of $50 Belize electric bills when we lived in town.
One vote for the Vape Mat. It simply works for me at 14 hours. This is for the original FumaKilla. Other generics last 10 hours max.
Vape. This is good to know.. I’m moving to the Dominican Republic in a few weeks and the mosquitos there almost killed me the last time I was there!
Greetings from Barcelona..
http://www.thetravellinggypsy.com
He is not in Belize currently Monika and has a very off beat sense of humor.
I read a this and a few other comments of this “al salter”. How can such a frustrated person continue living in Belize. How can such a person be allowed to destroy the reputation of this wonderful country …
Thanks Susan – you get used to taking things with a grain of salt [or sometimes pound] living on an island. The real issue at first was the dyslexia between the 2 Als – Allan salter and Alan Slater. We named the blow crocodiles in our pool the 4 Als and I keep waiting to find out who the other 2 real life ones are are.
CT Do they wear Elvis wigs too or the funny glasses with sideburns attached?
Laurie: I was not aware till recently that my better ? half was writing his usual crap to your fine blog as he does with CBC. Please do not take anything he says too seriously. Best wishes S.B.
Ah Mosquitoes! They can get so big here in Memphis that they can stand flatfooted and rape a turkey! Thankfully with the May floods we only have snakes to contend with here downtown as the mosquitoes haven’t really shown up yet [knocking the hell out of some wood].
To combat them here we plant citronella plants around the house and spray some $20.00 insect spray under our porch. That and buy a pantsload of Off skeeter spray!
Not only do natural body oils combined with dirt make you bug and waterproof – also makes you people proof ha ha
I lived in the sub arctic for years.The mosquitos there are large enough to require landing lights. There ain’t nothin’ I don’t know about these offensive critters. Belizean species (Aedes) are low fliers and have more stealth plus they never go away. Chemical solutions are of limited value. Deet can remove paint, want that on your skin?
Answers: Smoke cigars continuously: akin to a smudge fire. Don’t bathe much. Natural body oils combined with dirt make you bug and waterproof.
Always travel in the bush walking betwen 2 well perfumed women wearing dark clothes. Drink 6 to 8 beers per day: the stench as you sweat it out through your oily skin does the job. Combining all the above reduces your chances of acquiring dengue hemmoraghic fever.