Question:
My wife and I are going to be vacationing on the Olympic Penninsula with our
two 18-month old kids in a couple weeks. I'm wondering if anybody has any
suggestions on how to help the kids deal with mosquitos. I'm somewhat loathe
to put any sort of high concentration DEET on them, but i am skeptical about
the effectiveness of some of the natural citronella-based products. I do
figure we can drape mosquito netting over the sunshields on the baby backpacks
when we're out and about, but I don't really know what to do while we're in camp.
Does anybody have any experience with this? I imagine the bugs could be
pretty bad on parts of the OP.
Answer:
-The citronella-based products work well for me, as long as I avoid using
any kind of fragrances. This means in shampoo, in conditioner, in
deodorant, in skin creams, you name it.
The kids are gonna get bit, that's just reality, and they're too young to
be taught not to scratch. I'd say use the citronella and maybe think
about rigging an awning of netting.
-I recently spent several days backpacking in heavy mosquito conditions.
My sister was planning to bring her 2-year-old daughter, but at the last
minute decided to leave her with grandparents. Anyway, we wondered how
miserable it might have been for the infant (and the rest of us) with
the mosquitos swarming as they were. My suggestion would be to NOT
trust any citronella-based repellent, nor to expect that any DEET
wristbands placed near the child will be sufficient. We found that even
high concentrations of DEET only worked for a while (i.e., within an
hour the mosquitos didn't seem to mind it anymore). I guess your best
bet for the child would be mosquito-netting, along with "timing." Our
most successful mosquito-avoidance tactic turned out to be calculating
which times of the day we'd allow ourselves to be targets. For
instance, we'd read books in our tents from 6pm-9pm (peak mosquito time)
and then cook dinner in the dark (mosquito-free for some reason). Of
course, I'm not sure how bad the mosquitos will be where you are going,
nor if the behavior of the mosquitos will be anything like the behavior
of those we encountered. (We were in the Sabrina Basin of Inyo N.F. in
California). I imagine it's possible that citronella-based or other
natural repellents are effective in some areas....but I certainly
wouldn't bet my trip on it.
