Managing Mosquitoes in a Healthier & more Sustainable Way

Growing up in Florida and eventually living along the canals in Venice, California, my partner and I are no strangers to mosquitoes. Now, being back in the woods of the muggy southeast, we’re once again faced with a sudden and intense mosquito season. After getting bit on the eyelid the other day (a first for me,) and watching my eye swell for two days, I figured it was time to break out my preferred gear for managing the bugs for our home and family. Here are my favorites, including my new MVP from an ethical, low waste brand that I’ve long adored. 

Mosquito Repelling, Plant-Based Lotion Stone
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Why I like it: This lotion stone is easy to apply, works, and feels good on the skin. Plus it’s a very low waste product with minimal packaging and zero plastic. 
About the stone: The Kate McLeod Dusk Stone is a bar that melts on contact, and is comprised of simple yet powerful ingredients that are full of antioxidants and fatty acids to heal and soothe skin while acting as a natural insect repellant. It’s a highly concentrated formula made without water, synthetics, or alcohols. 

Insect Shield Clothing
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Why I like it: I keep our insect shield scarves wrapped around our sun hats so we never forget them. This insect shield clothing can help reduce overall pesticide and repellent use, and puts the repellent next to your skin rather than on it. All dye colors are  non-toxic and processed in a closed loop water system that recycles 100% of the water used in processing. 
About: Pang Wangle Earth-friendly, Insect Shield® clothing repels mosquitoes, ticks, flies, fleas, chiggers, ants, midges. It's EPA approved for everyone, including infants, pregnant or nursing women, even pets.  

All Natural Repellent for the whole family, including pups
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Why I like it: This family-friendly, all-natural bug spray, which comes in a stainless steel canister that we reuse, was developed for the humid, hot, swampy, bug infested climates of Florida.
About: Beat It contains no deet, no chemicals, and no artificial ingredients. It can be used on babies, children, pregnant women, AND pets. Beat It repels ticks and fleas on cats and dogs and keeps flies off horses.

Bee-Safe, Non-toxic Mosquito Repellent Sticks
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Why I like it: The smell of this bee-safe formula doesn’t bother me the way citronella sometimes does, and the sticks burn smoothly for over 2 hours.
About: Madison James Flyaway Sticks keep away mosquitoes, horseflies, hornets, and the common fly, without hurting bees. They’re made in limited batches in the USA with highly effective ingredients, and are hand-packaged in a repurposed farm feed bag.

Soothing Bite Balm
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Why I like it: Our 6 year-old has long appreciated this soothing balm, so we add a dab here and there when necessary. And I like that it comes in a tin rather than plastic, and it made by a Certified B Corp.
About: Murphy’s Naturals Bite Relief Soothing Balm uses soothing ingredients, like andiroba, eucalyptus, and chamomile oils. 2% of all sales goes back to communities working to better people and the planet. Murphy’s Naturals is a 1% For The Planet member, which means 1% of all revenues help fund environmental organizations.

Citronella Incense Hanging Coil
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Why I like it: This is what we use if we have a larger outdoor gathering. It’s pretty, has a large coverage area when suspended high, and is nontoxic to people and animals. 
About: This Fredericks & Mae Citronella Incense Hanging Coil lets off a slow-and-steady stream of citronella-infused smoke with the lemony scent of citronella

A Fan + Plants
There’s nothing more annoying than hearing mosquitoes buzz around you overnight, knowing you’ll wake up with welts. We sometimes point a fan towards the bed with a potted lavender plant situated behind it to help prevent the buzz and bites. (Not sure how much the lavender helps, but it smells amazing.)

Long Linen Clothing
When in a hurry or a pinch, we fall back on long linen clothing. It helps block the sun and shield somewhat from mosquitoes, while allowing our skin to breathe in the intense summer heat and humidity. 

Frequently Asked Question: What do we do about bugs?

Thanks to the weather here in Southern California, we live a very fluid indoor/outdoor lifestyle year-round. Our windows and doors are almost always thrown open wide, welcoming in the ocean air, the occasional hummingbird, and, inevitably, some bugs. 

Not a day goes by that someone doesn’t message me to ask what we do about critters making their way into the Cottage, or finding their way down from the vine canopy. So I thought it was time to post about what we do (and don’t do) to manage our tiniest housemates. 

First, keep in mind that bugs in Los Angeles are nothing compared to bugs in many (probably most) other places. I’m from Florida, and we could never leave our home open there unless we wanted to be swarmed by mosquitos and joined by snakes (and perhaps an alligator or two) while going about our business indoors. Screens and overhead fans are borderline necessities in my childhood home, whereas here at the Cottage we have neither.

At the end of the day, it’s not my goal to rid our home of any living thing beyond our family of 5 and our plants. I feel like it’s all a natural balance, and that if we have healthy soil and thriving greenery we’ll have more pollinators and bugs. (And other than the damned mosquitoes, that’s quite all right by me.) Here’s how we handle it.

MOSQUITOES
Since we’re located by the canals, we sometimes get mosquitos. During the drought, there were few to none. But in the (blessedly) wetter years, we get mosquitoes from roughly April through November. (As we had a particularly wet March, the little rudelings already here for 2020.)

To keep them off of us at night, we use a box fan that we point at the bed. This is nice anyways, as we don’t have (or want) AC. When in the garden during sunset when they’re most active, we’ll wear long linen clothing and burn these non-toxic, bee safe mosquito repellent sticks, which we simply stake into the pea gravel. The smell doesn’t bother me the way citronella sometimes does, and the sticks burn smoothly. 

For a bit of extra coverage if we’re hosting or if we’re in the thickest part of summer, we’ll sometimes add a citronella hanging coil, and/or a traditional multi-wick candle. We also have a smattering of Aunt Fannie’s Mosquito products— West is particularly fond of this tin of “balm-balm,” as he calls it.

SPIDERS
I know spiders give a lot of folks the shivers, but they simply don’t bother us. In fact, since they helps us keep other bugs at bay, we appreciate them. If we find one in a corner of the shower or up on the ceiling bends, we just help them outside via a jar. No biggie.

When it comes to the vines, we sometimes see webs, but rarely are they occupied. They’ve never repelled down onto us. However, we tread slowly through the garden during the early morning hours, as more than a few set up camp overnight and need a some extra seconds to raise up out of the pathway back into their secret hiding spots.

HUMMINGBIRDS & BUTTERFLIES
Winged beauties will sometimes fly into our home and try to escape through the skylights (which, sadly, don’t open). With a bit of patience, we’re always able to get them to land on a potted plant that we then carefully carry back outside.

MISC BUGS
We almost never see other bugs in the house. (Again, it’s LA— I know that’s not typical of other environments.)  But if we get sugar ants or or fruit-flies (which sometimes happens in July/August), we use non-toxic fruit fly punch and simple soap-and-water solutions to curb the onslaught.