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The one mosquito in my room
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this post was submitted on 02 Aug 2024
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Are you from the swamps?
Heh. I'm from Europe, each summer vacation we used to travel around and save on hotels by going camping.
At Venice, and Milan, they had a bunch of the huge zappers near the entrance, to lure mosquitoes away from the camping area. We'd usually get back from sightseeing after sunset, and had to go straight through the mosquito clouds at their strongest. First time, my mom was talking... then coughing, then cussing. We made sure to kept our mouths shut after that ๐
Other places, they'd have space heaters on cafeteria terraces, turned on for heat on cold days, and again on, to lure and kill mosquitoes in the summer after sunset.
I also live on the ground floor, with some plants on the terrace. While cats tend to catch most of the pests, there is always a mosquito or two that manage to get inside. Sleeping with a fan set on low, blowing across the bed and spreading the CO2 from your breath away, is a surefire way to keep them from biting.
Mosquitoes are slightly phototaxic, like most insects, but they mainly guide themselves towards CO2 sources for biting.
Damn I better take down my photos then.
Uhm... what? ๐คจ
Well, you mentioned they're photo-taxic.
But I all seriousness: how can I properly kill that one single fucker? Yesterday I sacrificed a few years of my life considering the amount of DEET I sprayed. I have a fan but it's just too noisy to sleep. I guess I could wear earplugs.
The other solutions are a bit overkill rn.
Thanks for your detailed responses.
โ๏ธ๐ฏ... ๐คฆ๐
You can try a zapper, but the "partially" means they do react to light, but don't go towards bright sources. Instead, they seek damp shadow during the day, then start flying during twilight in the general direction of the sky, looking for CO2 traces, and mostly stay put during the night, but occasionally may fly towards warm damp places emitting CO2, which usually means some animal.
The problem with insect repellents, is that they just temporarily move the problem, they don't fix it. A silent natural repellent would be a citronella plant, if you don't mind the smell. The fan trick is also technically a repellent, with the benefit that eventually they end up flying in circles until they die of exhaustion. There are "ultrasonic" repellers, but if you have good hearing, they might drive you crazy (they operate at 18-24KHz, I used to hear past 20KHz).
Now that I also have some tinnitus at a perceived frequency above 20KHz, a fan generates enough noise to kind of mask it, and it's either that or playing some pink noise... so fan it is.
My father used to catch mosquitoes by just waiting until they landed to bite, then slapping them quick. The trick is to pinpoint them by ear, then move your hand to catch them when they jump backwards. That was a useful solution when sharing a camping tent ๐
Another supposed way is to build a "water, sugar, and yeast" trap in a bottle. It's supposed to emit CO2, attracting the mosquitoes, then trap them in the bottle. Some assembly required. I haven't had luck with that, though.
Can you explain your father's approach a bit more?
Honestly, I just want a set of lasers that shoot at it from different angles at very low power, so it's safe to us, but just enough to fuck it up.