Hey Everyone,

I need some advice. Our trip to Alaska is just two months away and one concern on my mind is how to keep the trip from being miserable for the kids in regards to mosquitos and no see ums. For those of you that have taken kids there or love there, any advice?

I know head nets, candles, dress in layers and cover all you can. I know that time of year makes a difference (we are going in June). Also it just depends on what kind of mosquito season they are having. I read some place to use as close to 100% deet on exposed skin and that the regular spray on clothes is sufficient.

We will be taking some cortisone cream as well as other bite stuff. Not always, but sometimes, Adam will swell up from bites. I just want to do all I can to mitigate it.

Thanks,
Cory

100%deet is best
Sometimes you just have to have a head net.
Spray stuff works okay and it's easy. I usually carry Ben's 100 and a couple cans of cutters or whatever and always have a net I. My pocket


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I don't know if the mosquitoes have changed in the last 47 years, but when we moved to Anchorage in May 1970, I quite honestly found the mosquitoes to be much less of a problem than I had expected. Our kids were 4 1/2 years and 10 months, and neither of them was bothered all that much, either. What I discovered was that I was used to mosquitoes with a 3/8" wingspan that are really mean and almost impossible to kill--typical Wyoming--but Alaska mosquitoes are a lot larger (not quite like a bird, but it seemed like it ), but a wave of the hand would kill them.

We spent a lot of time outdoors over the 3 years we lived in Alaska, camping all over the Kenai Peninsula, up the Susitna River, into the Matanuska Valley, along the Copper River, just about everywhere we could drive, and we just used Off or Cutters lotion or spray. Yeah, we'd get bit occasionally, and nobody much likes the smell of the stuff, but it wasn't all that unpleasant at all.

Cary

https://www.amazon.com/Coghlans-0057-Bu ... =bug+shirt

These work real good, and you don't have to put chemicals on your young kids.

Cary, I don't know if its different down in Los Anchorage, but in the interior I swear the mosquitos could carry you away some years.

I remember that they seem to grow in "hatches." When the ground thawed you'd get the big, slow and stupid ones, then enough of them would lay eggs after a few weeks and you'd get the small, fast, and smart ones. Eventually those would get bigger and dumber and slower, rinse and repeat.

Don't believe for a moment that all Alaska mosquitoes are big bombers and easy to swat, or that you won't get into serious massive swarms of them after an emergence.

Get some bug jackets: https://www.rei.com/search?q=Bug+jackets

We carried bug jackets that had DEET applied in the bag they were stowed in. Those were great, but speedy.

For a short trip, I'd get everyone an inexpensive mesh jacket, and stock up on DEET, though it's readily available everywhere in AK. I prefer the 100% stuff as well when the bugs are bad. If they're not bad, I don't use the stuff at all. Bear in mind that DEET melts foam rubber, and some plastics. A fish squeezer got into the copilot seat of my brand new C 185 with a small bottle of DEET in his back pocket. Melted a cavity in the foam of that seat. It would have required too much paperwork if I'd shot him, but I gave it serious consideration.

Also, give the kids careful instructions on the stuff, and only apply with an adult present. Stings like a bitch in ones eyes......

MTV

For sure others have way more experience in Alaska then I, but my first year there and of all the places I visited I got bit less then a half dozen times. I just stayed out of the trees. Maybe I just got lucky. I didn't put any spray or netting on although I certainly carry it all the time. Driving back up tomorrow, guess I'll find out soon if this year the skeeters treat me differently.


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Besides DEET wear the lightest color of clothing possible. White is best . Mosquitoes seek dark clothing and blue (I've read) was preferred. I have a white hooded sweatshirt, and that plus a head net and gloves in the pockets got me by in most areas including Alaska's North Slope in July. Bugs up there can fly in a 15 mph wind.

Tech trick when camping when breezy: Try to find some else to stand upwind of so the bugs fly to them and not you.

Wear no skin lotion or scent. Keep one of these handy to put on stings and bites. Contains ammonia which reacts with the acid bugs inject into you: http://www.tendercorp.com/after-bite

If you use a portable outdoor potty wear a long raincoat...you'll need the protection in some places for exposed skin.

Gary

I have used the Thermacell device on many camping and hiking trips in BC. It works great. The Mosquitos stay away. I have the older model of this device. It even works while hiking and having it mounted on your belt.

https://www.thermacell.com/products/mos ... ller-olive

I will come say hello when i see a family dressed in white wearing head nets and gloves soaked in DEET. Look for the guy in flip flops and a t shirt.
Seriously tho i never use anything as strong as 100 and never spray that cancer on my skin. You will however find me washing engine parts with my bare hands in 100LL the next day. Its fine it evaporates fast right?

The mosquitos dont bug my kids a whole lot. They are easy. Spray some deet on their clothes and away they go. They do tend to freak out from the horse flies. The fun REALLY begins when you get some hitch hikers. Yeah those free loadin flies. Flying in my airplane one might think a bear was hiding under the seat only to jump out mid flight to terrerize my kids. Their screams would make you think thats the case. One lone fly or mosquito will send them into hysteria. Only during take off. Your wife will not be able to reach either so good luck with that.

An alternative to DEET is Picaridin (20%) which was shown to be as effective as DEET in N. Australia. Picaridin does not smell, is not oily and does not melt plastic things, but does repel mosquitoes really well.

I have been using it for at least five years and find it to be very effective. I changed from DEET when a bottle of DEET in my kit leaked and totally melted the back off a travel alarm.

Some of the Australian lit. suggests using the 10% concentration for kids, but I have no idea about that.

Evidently you can buy the 20% concentration picaridin in the USA now. Sawyer makes a 20% available from Amazon. Looks to be cheaper than the Autan I purchased through Pharmacy2U or Chemist Direct in the UK before it was available in the US.

A hat of some sort, long sleeved shirt, and long pants, leaves very little exposed to get bitten. A little bug dope applied to the exposed skin and you are good to go for hours. Kids adapt better than adults. It seems they go for the head first. spray a little on the outside of the hat as well. Then forget the bugs. You can tell the newcomers, they go around swinging their arms like that will clear a path. getting worked up just expels more co2. To a mosquito that means there is blood around close by.

CamTom12 wrote:https://www.amazon.com/Coghlans-0057-Bug-Jacket-Medium/dp/B000NDWOH6/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1491184008&sr=8-2&keywords=bug+shirt

These work real good, and you don't have to put chemicals on your young kids.

Cary, I don't know if its different down in Los Anchorage, but in the interior I swear the mosquitos could carry you away some years.

I remember that they seem to grow in "hatches." When the ground thawed you'd get the big, slow and stupid ones, then enough of them would lay eggs after a few weeks and you'd get the small, fast, and smart ones. Eventually those would get bigger and dumber and slower, rinse and repeat.

Cam, you nailed it. There was a study a number of years ago on that first emergence of mosquitoes that determined that they actually overwinter as adults in the bark of trees in the interior. In the spring, they emerge from the bark and as you say, they are big and pretty much stunned from winter....and easy targets for a good swat. But, their progeny......look out!

I was in Galena one early summer, staying in a bunkhouse there. Hot as hell at night, so I opened a window, having carefully checked the screen on it. Went to sleep and woke up a couple hours later, covered in skeets.....grrrr. Got up and looked again at the screen.....the little bastards were landing on the outside of the screen, and crawling through the mesh, then flying away!

Drenched myself in DEET and went back to bed.

As noted, bugs come in waves, and not just mosquitoes. Horse flys, other biting flies, and in the fall, no see ums, otherwise known as flesh grabbers, are miserable little buggers.

But, just stock up on the preventive measures, be prepared, and you may not need them at all.

MTV

MTV

No blackflies in Alaska? Just be thankful you don't have to contend with those. They don't just suck up a little bit of blood, they rip out a chunk of meat!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qjLBXb1kgMo

We don't have blackflies in the arctic above the tree-line. Mosquitoes are ubiquitous though. We keep our bug jackets in a zip-lock bag after spraying in some DEET-based repellant. Then you don't have to put that stuff directly on your skin. Cover up as much skin as possible.

When we were kids, camping in southern Canada, there would always be a mosquito or two in your tent after lights-out. You just had to lay there in the dark, knowing that bugger would eventually find you. The suspense was worse than the bite.

In the arctic, the mosquitoes are dumb. They get in your tent and then just bounce off the canvas looking for a way out to the 24-hour daylight. Idiots!

Better take Sprocket along and stake him out as a sacrificial lamb.

Some testing of mosquito repellants: https://academic.oup.com/jinsectscience ... 0/Efficacy

This looks promising: https://off.com/en/product/clip-on

Don't let the word efficacy scare you off. Just Ph. D. talk.

Gary

Long sleeve shirts and pants go a long way in preventing bites. You can get that stuff from the sport stores to soak you clothing in, it works great even north of the brooks. It is likely to cause some kind of cancer so don't know if I would use it on kids. I would use the spray DEET stuff. Give the hats and shirts a good spray and very light spray on the skin. Burning the smudge pot type of stuff good. They do make a net tent/gazebo you can hang from your wing that everyone can sit and relax in (oh ya its kids never mind) I think picking the proper camping spot, sand, gravel, and breeze is key. If you can get any type of fire a little smoke goes a long way.
DENNY

Here is a quite understandable document on repellents.

http://medent.usyd.edu.au/RepellentGuidelines.pdf

Deet efficacy plateaus at about 50%.

https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/travel/yellowbook ... arthropods

Don't much like spraying chemicals on my skin or my clothes, hands down the best bug shirt available is the original bug shirt: http://www.bugshirt.com. Remain calm, try not to swat at them too much and find a nice breeze when you can. The bigger fuss you make the more they will be attracted to you.

OE

Cory, trust me on this cause it works.... I use it every summer on my idaho trip to JC and never have a problerm with any bugs much less mosquitos.... take along a box of the dryer sheets you put in your dryer when drying your clothes... rub a dryer sheet on your clothes and hat and exposed skin.... it works believe me... and you'll smell good too....