The picture I grew up with of mosquito control is of a slow-moving vehicle spraying poison out the back while children ran along behind and played in the spray. This does not exactly conform to best practices for mosquito control. While pesticides may be necessary at some point for the control of mosquitoes, they should be used in a manner that does not expose people to them if at all possible. However, there are many things you can do to prevent mosquito problems that do not involve pesticides.
No Standing Water
Mosquitoes need still water to lay their eggs in and reproduce. Making sure that you have no sources of stagnant water around your house is one of the easiest ways to combat mosquitoes. Tires, empty flower pots, and toys that might hold water should be stored upside down or disposed of.
Treating Necessary Standing Water
Some things, though, have to stay. Birdbaths and watering troughs come to mind. Here you have a couple of options. You can use one of the little aerators that keep the surface of the water rippling to keep the mosquito from laying her eggs. In birdbaths and small water gardens, you can use a mosquito dunk, which is toxic to mosquito larvae and nothing else. Mosquito dunks are considered organic. Or you can use mosquito fish, little guppy size fish that live off mosquito larvae. They go in the water troughs and keep them free of mosquitoes. Some states regulate or ban these little fish, though, so check with your fish and game people before putting them in something.
Stay In At Dawn and Dusk
Mosquitoes are most active at dawn and dusk. If you keep yourself and your animals inside during these times, you reduce exposure to mosquitoes and mosquito-borne diseases. Make sure that horse stalls have good screens over their windows and other open spaces to prevent the mosquitoes from entering. Make sure the screens on your windows and doors are in good repair and do not have holes in them.
Dress To Protect
If you must be out during mosquito season, wear long-sleeve shirts and long pants with closed-toe shoes. Putting a repellant such as citronella or eucalyptus oil on can help. Do not put it undiluted on your skin or it may burn you. Dilute it with a carrier oil or put it on your clothes.
Mosquitoes carry some nasty diseases. Eliminating standing water, keeping your pets and yourself in during peak activity times, dressing appropriately, and making sure mosquitoes cannot come in where you are some easy ways to protect yourself from them.
Want to learn to garden? My first attempt at gardening ended up in failure. The weeds took over and squeezed the vegetables out. I was very frustrated by this waste of good seed, time, and money. So I became a master gardener and spent a lot of time helping other people avoid or overcome problems in their garden.
In order to help others garden successfully, I have written a book, Vegetable Gardening from the Ground Up, available in an ebook or a paperback from Amazon. It is also in Kindle Unlimited.
Don’t forget bats! One little bat can eat 5,000 mosquitoes a night. Yay, bats!
Bats eat a significant amount of insects. Putting up a bat house is a very wise thing to do.
Great tips — I am a mosquito magnet, so I’m always looking for ways to keep them away!
Some people are bitten if there is only one mosquito in the area. I am a bee and wasp sting magnet. My Mother is a mosquito magnet.
Too funny – as I am reading this I am getting 3 bites on my ankles by one single mosquito that got into the house just now when someone came inside. Drats, I’m all out of bats right now…
Glad to help. Screen doors make a huge difference. You can learn how to attract bats, too. And see my rather eccentric bat box installation.
Hi Stephanie
I am fortunate that mosquitoes don’t bother with me. But I have friends who get nasty lumps when the mosquitoes are around. Citronella seems to work outdoors if we are having a barbecue.
And I gave my friend a lavender spray I sourced from where I get my lavender products from. She took it on holidays with her and all the family used it. Worked for them so I can say the lovely lavender came up smelling sweet again 🙂
Patricia Perth Australia
Those scents work for some people and not others. Research has shown that most scents will deter mosquitoes about 20 minutes, while DEET works for hours, but some people do not like using pesticides and prefer the scents.
Deet should really be a non-issue by now. We don’t need it, and we haven’t for years. Citronella works like a charm, maybe not the candles, but the repellent you rub on your skin. Just go to your local Whole Foods or some similar store, and you’ll get to pick and choose your non-harmful mosquito repellent. It is completely safe including for children and works in environments like the Everglades.
The products are all there. We just need to get people to use them – probably an easier undertaking than convincing them to keep bats. 😉
Electric wired Tennis racket, this works well for me. Just hit them with it and they will get toasted like a bbq! You would be just like doing an exercise and best thing of it is it’s fun.
Fun, but sprays bug parts all over. One study showed those big bug zappers were spraying little bug parts all over the BBQ, so I don’t use them. Pity, it was fun.
But actually here in our country we’re in a great battle of dengue fever cases, specially in squatter areas where stagnant water are everywhere. Preventing them from making new eggs is the most effective way than actually killing each one of them.
If you kill the wigglers, they can’t reproduce. Since it is much easier to treat the stagnant water than kill the flying insects, that is what we focus on.
Exactly, that’s why they always say Prevention is better the Cure. Thanks for sharing this to us Steph!