Shop Angels....

bladegrinder

Well-Known Member
Does anyone else have a mosquito problem in their shop this time of year? I live in Florida and even have them in Dec., Jan., and Feb.This time of year it's hot and rainy on a daily basis and shop angels are in full swing. I went in my shop this afternoon and two were on me in 5 min.
Fans just seem to make them spin their turbos to get to you, the ones I get are fighters.

I have all kinds of repellants, mostly with deet that stink...greasy....sticky, and melt plastic, I absolutely hate using the stuff.
when I'm in the woods you got to do what you got to do, but I hate having to use bug spray at home in my shop.

Enter......my final solution......."PICARIDIN". this stuffs been out a couple years now but not sold everywhere, I found some at a sports store and saw it listed on flea bay. the stuff I got was made by Sawyer Inc. in Safety Harbor, a couple miles from where I live. Skeptical but it has a lot of good reviews. fast forward 1 year.....this stuff is great.

It only has a trace of odor that goes away to nothing in a few min. not greasy or oily and doesn't damage synthetics. I transferred it to two unused plastic perfume type atomizer spray bottles. You'll forget you ever put it on in a few min. and it works 100%, a mosquito won't come anywhere near you.

Just putting the word out that I tried and use this stuff and give it 5 stars.
I actually scratched a sheath once with an awl while swatting a swamp angel, ruining it.
It's cost a little more than Deet based bug sprays but it's worth it. I'll never spray anything else on me again.
 
Will give it a try and let you know what I think!! There is nothing more aggravating than to be concentrating on doing something in the shop and one is eating at the buffet between shoulder blades. Or buzzing around your head, buzzzzzzzzzzzz! It is enough to drive a sane man crazy!!

Here a while back I left the door to my garage/shop open while finishing up the mowing. Well of course the mowing drove them out of the grass. They were so bad when I got into the shop I had to take the shop back.
Sooooooooooo, I tried an ole trick another Florida boy had showed me. Take one of those ole shop rags light the end of it, once it gets to going good blow out the fire and it will smolter along till it literally burns up the rag. Shut the lights out in the shop and open the doors. They want to get out of the smoke. Then turn the fan on low at one end and let it push the smoke around the room and out the other open door. Close the doors and turn the lights back on!!

When in Florida you got to be smarter than the bugs you are fighting! :eek::D

Steve you were talking about them surviving.

Even the coldest days that we had this year was in the single digits and teens for a week at a time. They never go away. They will seek the moisture under the forest canopy. You can kick the pine straw and watch them crawl out from under it!! As soon as it warms a little they are back in force. I have them during the winter come in. They will seek the water of a commode and the drains are another place they go!!

I love watching the bats right at dark, they are having a heyday flying and chomping away!!
 
I'll pass on the burning rags Ha ha. but I am wanting to build a couple bat houses for my new place up in the panhandle.
I'm looking at building big ones like 2'X3' and use a climber tree stand to get them way high in pine trees.
the only bummer is I've read where sometimes it takes years for them to move in and sometimes they never do.
it's too bad you can't do like honey bees and just put a queen bat in there. ;)
 
Does anyone else have a mosquito problem in their shop this time of year? I live in Florida and even have them in Dec., Jan., and Feb.This time of year it's hot and rainy on a daily basis and shop angels are in full swing. I went in my shop this afternoon and two were on me in 5 min.
Fans just seem to make them spin their turbos to get to you, the ones I get are fighters.

I have all kinds of repellants, mostly with deet that stink...greasy....sticky, and melt plastic, I absolutely hate using the stuff.
when I'm in the woods you got to do what you got to do, but I hate having to use bug spray at home in my shop.

Enter......my final solution......."PICARIDIN". this stuffs been out a couple years now but not sold everywhere, I found some at a sports store and saw it listed on flea bay. the stuff I got was made by Sawyer Inc. in Safety Harbor, a couple miles from where I live. Skeptical but it has a lot of good reviews. fast forward 1 year.....this stuff is great.

It only has a trace of odor that goes away to nothing in a few min. not greasy or oily and doesn't damage synthetics. I transferred it to two unused plastic perfume type atomizer spray bottles. You'll forget you ever put it on in a few min. and it works 100%, a mosquito won't come anywhere near you.

Just putting the word out that I tried and use this stuff and give it 5 stars.
I actually scratched a sheath once with an awl while swatting a swamp angel, ruining it.
It's cost a little more than Deet based bug sprays but it's worth it. I'll never spray anything else on me again.
Yes I have the same issues, I just use mosquito coils and place there extra large in 4 place in my shop and they do the trick, use lavender smells nice
 
I use to use the coils, and they worked great for my small shop. I used to buy them at ace hardware.
but then I went there and the brand I bought for years wasn't there anymore, they were replace by a brand made in China with a different active ingredient. I didn't want to breath any smoke that originated in China.
I found the good ones on flea bay but they were kind of pricy.

I'm going to stick with the picaridin, that way I only use it when I need to rather than burning a coil if their not bad.
as for health, breathing that coil smoke has to do something, to some extent.
and there's no way this stuff could be nearly as bad as Deet.

I used 100% deet for three days in a row once hunting hogs in swamp land and on the third day I had to throw in the towel, it made me feel like I was seasick.
one other thing I've found to work is burning cattails { the ones that grow in ponds ;) not from cats.} but they have to be dry just right or they either don't burn or fall apart, but they really stink...like a muck fire.
 
They can certainly be a problem in Northern Indiana as well, though lately it's been hot and dry enough that I've yet to notice too many. I'll have to look into Picaridin though, because, like you, I do hate most bug sprays.

Now, I may be going to south FL in July for a week, and normally while I'm down there, I get annihilated by "no-see-ems". Do you have those little biting gnats in your area? Wonder how the Picaridin will work on those? Seems like even if I hose down with deet, they still find a way to chew me up...
 
I don't have no see ums in my area, their mostly around salt water and salt water marsh areas but I'm well aquinted with the misery they inflict. especially when they get your ears. they are by far the worst of biting insects.
the bad thing about using Deet with no see ums is they seem stick to you, then bite.
I haven't used Picaridin for no see ums yet but I think it may work, and they wont stick to you this stuff dries after you put it on.

no see ums will definatly ruin a good time in short order.
 
thanks for the heads up on picaridin. i have been using No-Nats which is an all natural mixture. it works great. You can make it yourself with basic stuff and some essential oils.

I got so fed up with mosquitoes eating me slive in the shop that i made a bug net. I can’t work with the shop closed up because it’s 197 degrees in here with 347 percent humidity, so I hung screen material from the garage door. With my fan i still get airflow. The screen keeps out almost all of the mosquitoes.
 
Try the Picaridin John, and if you do post back here with your opinion.
I've tried just about every concoction know to man and frankly none worked very well UNLESS they had Deet in them.
and most all were greasy-nasty-stinky crap that I hated putting on me only to find out it hardly worked but was nasty enough to keep reminding me it was on me. not to mention who really knows what's in a lot of this stuff that going thru your skin into your blood.

Here I am worried about Coco Bolo dust when it's the bug spray killing me.

Don't get me wrong, Deet certainly has it's place. just not in my shop.
If I were hunting in an area known to have ticks carrying lyme disease or the area had mosquitoes that were found to carry west nile virus or Deng fever I would use Deet.
But for around the house and in the shop it's Picaridin for me. I used it for the first time hunting in the panhandle last year and it worked, and I don't think the deer smelled it.
 
I can’t work with the shop closed up because it’s 197 degrees in here with 347 percent humidity

Dang John, where do you live?????????? Ha Ha!

Steve, I got some of the Picaridin yesterday gonna give it a try!!

I will tell you something that works on the no-see-ums. Avon Skin So Soft. It has perfume to it and oily but it works!! They still lite but, they don't bite and by the end of the day it will turn your arms black with all the no-see-ums stuck to them!! LOL I have worked on the bays around here building homes on pilings and it beats me how you would be able to enjoy the view unless it was screened in!! The no-see-ums will start in the morning and depending on the area the mosquitos come in around 12 noon till dark and eat what the no-see-ums have left!! And if you are on the water with lights at night, (I use to bowfish) the white flies will smother you from dark till daylight!!

Needless to say I live about 18 miles inland. We don't have the no-see-ums, or white flies but, the mosquitoes make up for the lack of the other two! Clearing off the forest area behind my house has helped but, now the grass has to be mowed. Somedays you can't win for losing!! :eek::p

EDIT: I forgot to say. Avon has gotten so much publicity from the Avon Skin So Soft being some of the best repellent. They were not always happy that a product they developed for beauty was being used for bug repellent. They now have a version out for bug repellent, (can't remember what it is called) and they took out the perfume in this version!! I got a buddy who uses it and swears by it on the water when he is fishing. He carries wipes and once he applies it he cleans his hands so it is not on his equipment or his line!!
 
Thermacell's work great, I've got three that I keep up in the woods for hunting but their kind of pricy to run one in the shop every day. the refill packs are like $20.00
Trying to get around having to buy their refills....which your stuck having to but theirs, at their price...I found a way to refill the butane cylinders but no way to recharge the pads.

Interestingly....the chemical in their pads is the same one used in the coils I used made by Coghlan - "d-cis trans allethrin".
I can't figure a way to transfer that chemical from the coils to the pads and I don't know that it would be cost effective, but I surely would rather run a thermacell over burning a coil, but like I said, I'm done burning and breathing those coils in my shop.
I've looked for the chemical on the web and only found 55 gallon barrels from overseas.

So.......I'm going with the picaridin for working in the shop. it seems like the most cost effective, safe product that works...
and it doesn't stink, or start fires.
 
I found it at Dicks sporting goods in Clearwater John, but according to google you can order it from a lot of places.
 
Thanks guys. I'll grab a bottle for sure. Like I said, I am having great results from the No-Natz but if this works better I'm all for it.
 
Boy has the humidity been up these past few days. The good thing about it though- the mosquitoes can't get me because when they try to fly through the air they get stuck.
 
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