Perfect timing.... I'll anxiously watch this space for some relief..... Can't even be outside for 2 minutes this week.

Perfect timing.... I'll anxiously watch this space for some relief..... Can't even be outside for 2 minutes this week.

I'd suggest some BTi mosquito dunks for the culverts at least.

I'd guess if the Dynatrap works, it'll mostly be due to the light. You'll catch all sorts of interesting insects with a UV light at night.

Dh uses a ThermaCELL when grilling. For years he used citronella candles, but now prefers the CELL.

Here is a link that might be useful: ThermaCELL

Fori, forgot to say we do use the dunks but they are less effective now than they were five years ago. We have selectively bred for Mosquitos that are immune to it.

I JUST bought one and hung it up. We don't have world class mosquitoes in my part of the NW, but I live in the woods and in the late afternoon they are buzzing around my 2 year old grandson when he tries to play outside. I've only used it for about a week and the jury is out on mosquito control. It's FILLED with insects tho and hard to differentiate. It's catching all kinds of moths which I feel badly about, because I have a little bird sanctuary (apparently no mosquito eaters) and know the birds eat the moths. It also has cleared up a problem I have around all my doors with some kind of little gnat that lives here all winter and come inside in droves when I open a door at night. They don't bite, but it's very annoying and they foul the hummingbird feeder almost the minute I put it out with clean nectar.

So...it works on bugs, just don't know about mosquitoes yet. I bought mine from Hammacher Schlemmer because of their lifetime guarantee.

I had it on day and night at first until I saw all the poor moths, so now I turn it off at night and make sure it is on when the mosquitoes would be out and about.

If you're sitting outside in a small area, use big box fans to blow them away. Of course this only works on a porch or patio, but it does work. Mosquitoes are very light weight and cannot fly in a strong breeze.

Here's another gadget that sucks the mosquitoes through the fan and catches them in a net bag. I never tried it. You can make your own or buy them from skeeterbag.com

Here is a link that might be useful: trap mosquitoes with a fan

We have a 2.+ acre pond that leads into a stream on our property. This will be only our second summer here, but we have been pleasantly surprised by the light mosquito presence. We also own a lakehouse that, for reasons I cannot understand, has almost no mosquitos. But, we had a very mild winter so we expect more trouble this year.

On your property, i am assuming the creeks are running and so not an issue. The culverts and pond are probably the source? Have you looked into any landscape design choices that might move water differently for the culverts?

As to the pond, do you have a good fish population? Are they good and hungry? Is the pond deep enough? Is there much vegetation on the pond surface or edge?

We use well water, have a large organic vegetable garden, and we even eat trout that we catch in the pond (we stock the pond). For those reasons, we do not want to use insecticides. The expert who takes care of our pond tells us hungry fish (trout, bass and sunfish) and a clean pond (we use algea-eating carp) are our best bet for insect control. Also, I don't know if your pond is man made or not, but if it is it may help to make it deeper. Shallow water, even if just at the edges, is a breeding ground.

HTH, but be sure to let us know what you find in your research.

Something we are trying for the first time this year -- garlic oil (sold as Mosquito Barrier and others). DH mixes about 3 oz in water and sprays around the yard. You can add a little canola oil and spray areas with standing water to prevent breeding there. From the review, some folks seem to get 2-4 weeks out of it, but we're spraying once a week right now. That could be because of our neighbor's yards or the fact that we are in the subtropics. Still beats the things with gas tanks and cartridges in cost and environmental impact. My birds, butterflies and caterpillars are all safe but the skeeters aren't happy. And if I have any bats or other skeeter eating critters about -- I hope they like Italian -- or at least garlic! ;-) I couldn't water my plants without having 5 or 6 on me and now we can actually sit outside. The odor is definitely there when you spray, but it fades fairly quickly -- half and hour to an hour and it's not strong. Overnight and you don't notice it. Works for us.

I use these mosquito dunks. No harm to the environment and if the area they are in dries up they aren't ruined, they'll reactivate when it gets wet again. I forget how long they last, a month maybe? You can find them at most any hardware or home center store. I've used them in my bird baths, 1/4 to 1/3 of a dunk. A rental property we have has a very low spot on the adjoining wooded property line that collects standing water, anywhere from the size of a small creek alongside the property line to a pool the size of a small pond at the point nearest the house, depending on rain. Because of the woods and grasses growing there, mosquitoes are wicked bad, you can't get within a 100' of that area without being swarmed. One summer we were doing a lot of remodeling to that house & were outside a lot. I threw the dunks into that strip of water per the instructions (don't skimp on them). It was about this time of year and then I kept replenishing them when it was time. Made a dramatic improvement. Changed it from attacking swarms to just random mosquitoes here and there like any backyard, made it so much more pleasant outside. And it won't hurt fish or birds, etc. I pay about $12 for a 6 pack at a hardware store.

Maybe we do need to make more extensive use of the dunks. I don't know how far Mosquitos travel but our culverts are far from the house / back decks and patio. The drive is a half mile from the street, thus the 12 culverts. But there are other low spots where I should use the dunks--- will get a car full this weekend.

Mtnredux, I never thought about the pond as a problem source of Mosquitos, as we also have bass, bream, catfish and one big old carp who is at least 24" long. But the sides are definitely shallower than they were six years ago., and the pond is more eutrophic generally (it is man made and was never oligotrophic). DH and I have talked about that process and have recently begun aerating the pond . We pump in water from one creek twice a week during the summer as it is so hot we have pretty significant evaporation. We're having the creek dredged where the irrigation foot valve draws water, and may have him just dredge the lower side of the pond while he's at it. You mentioned you've been renovating about three years now--- we've been on our exterior for about a year and I am just damn tired of it. If somebody drove up and offered us 90% of what we have in the property I would take it in a red hot minute. Oh wait, now that we have a gated entrance (another story for another day or year), that mythical buyer now couldn't come up to the house if s/he wanted to!

I live in GA, and the Mosquitos can be fierce! We spray the yard with bifen a couple of times each summer. It's what the pros use, and we buy it at a do it yourself pest control store. It's significantly less money than hiring an exterminator. With our neighbors permission, we spray over the fences onto their property as well. We also use dunks in our rain barrel, culvert and low spots in the creek. I have an outdoor oscillating fan on the deck, and I think that helps too. The Mosquitos are better than when we first moved in, but I still feel the need to have a basket of different types of insect repellent out when we entertain.

We live in an area saturated with lakes and wetlands and have never used anything more than off for mosquitoes even though the area is heavily populated with them. Are the chemicals in these different exterminator sprays safe for dogs?

The one we use is safe for dogs and children. (We have both!) It needs to dry first though. DH sprays in the evening, and we feel comfortable letting everyone back into the yard the next morning.

I don't have any suggestions to offer but I wanted to post about a house that is on our walking route. They spray their yard and I always thought very highly of them because when they do spray they put signs up to alert people walking their dogs. I always appreciated how considerate they were and the extra step that they take.

DS1 who is completely into experimenting watched that fan video and I have a feeling that one will be made by the end of the wknd!

fans work the best ime.
we set them up on opposite ends of the patio and blow them towards each other. i do have to nail down the napkins so they don't blow away, but it's such a small price to pay for no bugs!!
now they have the outdoor mister fans, i totally want to try them too, but they're a bit pricey.

Update: the thing catches a LOT of bugs --- many moths as noted above, and it is difficult to identify Mosquitos after they have desiccated even a little bit. So far fans seem to be the best choice, particularly now it is so hot. however, the thought of lugging a fan onto the lower deck when we want to sit out there makes me not even want to go out there! We can't leave it out on the weather. Likewise, our bedroom deck would have to have the cord running across a step up ypto the screened porch to be plugged in. That's not safe, and I am just shallow enough to not want to junk up our outdoor spaces with ugly fans. (DH bought one of those tall skinny fans yesterday that, while quiet and powerful, is one of the ugliest things I have ever seen and I would rather not sit out there if I have to look at it. )

:-(

kswl - They make fans that can handle the weather and aren't too ugly. Ours lives on our deck May-October or so. We store it (along with the outdoor speaker)for the winter.

You can see the outdoor fan I got at either Lowes or Home Depot on the left.

{{!gwi}}

Very nice, porkandham, it looks very much like an all weather fan I found online that can be mounted to the brick wall. I'm ordering two and will get Handy Guy to hardwire the one upstairs into the same junction in the attic our awning motor is connected to, and mount the spa deck one on the retaining wall. More projects, but at least it won't be awful looking.

Just found out ThermaCELL is also available in lanterns.

Here is a link that might be useful: ThermaCELL

I had a thread on the conversations side about spraying for mosquitoes and was encouraged not to. I talked to the company further and even though they said it wouldn't harm wildlife and that we could show them areas not to directly spray (i.e. bunnies home), we decided against it. I like the fan idea but we have so many planters and baskets and climbing plants on our patio area, I don't think that would work. I saw those thermacell lanterns at bass pro shop - may try a couple. For now we're using our bug candles and our lanterns (filled with citronella) and torches.

tina

Tina, dh always used citronella candles too. When he ran out of those he started using the ThermaCELL. He swears by it.

Thanks Natal - do the mosquitos not bother you?

Allethrin (the synthetic active ingredient in the thermacell) is extremely toxic to bees and fish, so take care of where you use one of those.

Tina, I'm usually in the house fixing the rest of the meal while dh grills. Then if the weather isn't too hot we sit on the screened porch to eat.

I ordered two last night from Bass Pro Shop. Free shipping - there's one near us but in the "touristy" area, and we try to stay away from that traffic. LOL

We're on the patio just about every evening, so we'll see how they work. Nice that they are portable so we can carry around to the front porch if we want. I should try one of the clip on's for when/if I water in the evening. I had one of those Off clip-ons, which didn't work well at all. The gnats are what get me then.

tina

Again, garlic oil -- natural, nontoxic and only smells like you are cooking something potent for a short while (dissipates in 30 min to a hour). They also sell granules, but haven't tried those yet.

We bought one of the black thermacell lanterns today but have not been able to use it yet...it's raining! Hooray!

In other news two of the four the black lights (uv?) stopped working, I called Frontgate and they are sending a replacement out ASAP, "old" one to go back in the box the new one arrives in.

But it has been working, I was out yesterday evening and saw no Mosquitos or moths, either. Today I unscrewed the bottom of the thing off and dumped all the dead bugs into the pond. That, plus the dead snake that handy guy cut in two on the patio, should make the fish happy. Ugh.

Loooooove Arizona. No mosquitos at my house. It was 107 today, still very comfortable in the house. This evening it's still 96 but with the nice breeze outside, it's wonderful.

Much nicer than
when we were in Massachussets with 90+ degrees, high humidity and lots of bugs. Mosquitos would carry you off.

When we lived in New Hampshire, the mosquitos were awful in the summertime. We got a device called a Mosquito Magnet. I just looked it up online and you can see it at www.mosquitomagnet.com (no, we have nothing to do with the company). It runs off of a 20 lb. propane tank and an attractant called octenol...it produces carbon dioxide along with the octenol to "fool" the mosquitos into thinking it's a human being (and good eating!). It collects thousands of dead mosquitos into a bag which you empty, eventually reducing the population around your home. It worked great for us....although it only worked for a specific (maybe 50 foot square) area. If we went into the front yard, the mosquitos were there. When we left NH, we left the Mosquito Magnet for our home buyers. Now we are in AZ and there's none! :-)

When we lived in New Hampshire, the mosquitos were awful in the summertime. We got a device called a Mosquito Magnet. I just looked it up online and you can see it at www.mosquitomagnet.com (no, we have nothing to do with the company). It runs off of a 20 lb. propane tank and an attractant called octenol...it produces carbon dioxide along with the octenol to "fool" the mosquitos into thinking it's a human being (and good eating!). It collects thousands of dead mosquitos into a bag which you empty, eventually reducing the population around your home. It worked great for us....although it only worked for a specific (maybe 50 foot square) area. If we went into the front yard, the mosquitos were there. When we left NH, we left the Mosquito Magnet for our home buyers. Now we are in AZ and there's none! :-)

Kswl, I'm wondering what you think of your Dynatrap now that you've used it for a while? Mine has been catching lots of moths (which I don't want to catch because the birds eat them) and some little gnats that gather around the doors and come into the house in droves, but don't bite, but I couldn't tell if there were mosquitoes being caught, too, because they are so small and I can't tell them from the gnats.

Yesterday, I went out midday to fill the birdfeeders and I was swarmed with mosquitoes on my porch, about 10 feet from the Dynatrap, which was running. So I brought the trap closer (right next to me) to see what effect it had on the mosquitoes. Nothing, nada. They paid no attention to it and even when I tried to shoo them into the path of the fan, it maybe sucked one in.

I bought it from Hammacher Schlemmer because it has an unconditional return policy and I'm going to return it and try something else..maybe the mosquito magnet.

I'm interested in your results, though.

Hi I recently moved from Northern CA to Southern CA and the mosquitoes in the San Diego area are relentless (to our shock and surprise). They are the aedes aegypti mosquito which are commonly known as "ankle biters" but they will bite anywhere they can. The first month in San Diego I received no less than 40 mosquito bites nearly all on my ankles. They are small...but if you touch / scratch them they get larger and then the itching begins. I've learned not "do not touch under all circumstances" and they they go away in about 72 hours. The weather is getting cooler here but they are still out and about.

Now to the Dynatrap device. I read good reviews from a lot of people but with mixed advice. People who live on farms or places with wide open space, rivers, ponds, places water could stand anywhere near a house...had the most problems. We did have a small fountain pond which we quickly removed. That helped.

I hung the device about 30 feet away from where our outdoor sitting area is. The device should be 20-50 feet away from where the majority of your activity is based. You have to leave the machine running constantly, 24/7....and you have to be vigilant about that. Also the machine is greatly helped by a small packet of horridly smelling mosquito bait (small soaked pad with what smells like the worst animal urine on the planet). Don't worry you can only smell it when you open the package and after that....you can't smell it outdoors. But the mosquitos can find it and they most certainly do. The instruction say that you have to leave this device going non stop 24/7 never turning it off for a minimum of 30 days to see relief.

After 30 days you continue to leave it on BUT the mosquitos are now trained to go THERE instead of YOU. They think the device is a living breathing animal.

I will say, after 30 days...we do have a great deal of relief and I was outside for two nights and ZERO mosquito bites. It has gotten cooler now that it's November in San Diego but not that cool (maybe mid 50's?) But no bites.

The 10 bites a week is now down to more like maybe 1 a week if that.

The cost on this is that you have to replace the bulb light every 60-90 days and you also have to replace the stinky bait as well as that loses attractiveness over time.

The bottom of the container catches all sorts of bugs too, oddly moths are VERY attracted to this device and we have a TON of moths around here. So that's been helpful too.

At this point I would give two thumbs up to using a Dynatrap machine. It's not even noticeable outside, just the glowing purple blue light at night, that's it.

I will continue using this device as long as I live in this somewhat infested urban neighborhood.