Question:
I have seen many brands of mosquito trapping devices (such as Mosquito
Magnet) this year. The devices cost several hundred to over a thousand
dollars. The common response I hear from dozens of people I've asked about
it (who do not own one) is: It's expensive, but if it worked it would be
worth it.
Consumer's reports said they do work. Reviews on the Internet say they work
or don't work. A co-worker's friend has a Mosquito Magnet Pro and says it
works great. The reviews I've seen on television say those devices do not
work.
If anyone has direct experience with the mosquito traps, could you post a
response here if they work, or do not work?
Answer:
-If you go to groups.google.com and do a search there, you should find an old
thread about this subject.
-Based on my research the answer is...sometimes.
There are a number of devices out there. I've focused on two -- the
Mosquito Magnet line and the Mosquito Deleto.
The concepts are basically the same -- create heat and carbon dioxide,
couple it with octenol, then capture the mosquitoes. The Mosquito Magnet
uses a vacuum whereas the Mosquito Deleto uses the rough equivalent of fly
paper.
Since I don't have the bucks to get a Mosquito Magnet (although it would
have been my first pick) I went with a Mosquito Deleto. To date the
performance has been impressive.
We had not gotten around to picking up a canister of propane this year until
about a month ago. Any time we took a step in the back yard we were
instantly under attack. We hooked up the Mosquito Deleto and I think I've
been bitten twice since. The one thing commonly noted about this device
though is that there are never any mosquitoes on the sticky paper. I don't
know where they get all those skeeters in the commercials, but I never see
any on there. I had a garter snake get on there once though.
Simple fact of the matter -- without that thing going we're eaten alive,
with it running they leave us alone. That's good enough for me.
Coleman also makes a Mosquito Inibitor. This gives off a citrousy scent and
uses little foam inserts soaked in an oil repellant. FWIW, these things are
great for patios to drive away any others -- we have one in the front yard
and never get bitten when we have it out. Only down side is that the cost
of refills is nearly the same as the whole unit.
