Bug Zapper

[beren]

Whilst shopping this morning at Coles for groceries I came across an interesting bit of kit in the appliances section. Its a little rechargeable bug zapper.....year round the mozzies at my home are just relentless and even though I have a reasonable tolerance to these little vampires it's time for more aggressive methods even if its against my conscience {yes I am a hippee }.Obviously the ultraviolet light will be invasive to dark adapted eyes but it will be interesting to see how it goes, just hate using insect repellent/citronella candles around optics .

{pic attached- the light looks a lot brighter then it really is}

[rogerg (Roger)]

I wonder how effective it is.. I always had the (perhaps incorrect) impression that bug zappers needed reasonable voltage/wattage to fry the suckers.

Roger.

[Lee]

It looks like it pumps out a heap of white/visible light, which will do in your night vision, the UV component won't hurt your dark adaptation, might just give you a skin cancer instead!

[rogerg (Roger)]

ahh yeah.. forgot about the white light thing

[g__day (Matthew)]

The best ones are actually all plastic water containers with a red plastic strainer lid in the shape of a funnel with a small hole at the bottom. Fly walk in and can't figure how to walk out.

The container is 1/3 filled with water and attached to a fence 20 - 30 feet away from your nose - down wind! You add one teaspoon of this brown powder that lasts a season and smells like sh*t. You don't want to be around it or downwind of this thing! It catches flies like you simply wouldn't believe.

So the upside is its effective, very low cost, takes minimal space, works with water an a safe chemical, is set and forget (empty the dead flies as fertiliser every month or so for your garden) produces a by-product that is good garden fertiliser and requires no betteries nor produces any light to affect your astronomy. The down side is your neighbours downwind will be wondering WTF just died - which is another good thing if you are fighting with some annoying neighbours.

I think national geographic sell these things for $29 with a year or more's supply of bait. EFEKTO Fly Bait traps it says on the label.

http://www.premaorganics.com/fly.htm

[ving (David)]

drink lots of beer... mozzies dont like beer

oh and it will help you "see" better

[Doug]

A few drops of 'spoton' or similar applied to the back of the neck every 3 months. It works for dogs and cats.
It wont stop them dining in the first place, but they wont come back for seconds, and they wont feel much like laying eggs.

[OneOfOne (Trevor)]

Originally Posted by g__day

The best ones are actually all plastic water containers with a red plastic strainer lid in the shape of a funnel with a small hole at the bottom.
[snip]

Do they have something like that for mossies? The flys aren't a problem at night, but those mossies. I use repellant, but I don't like the idea of handling optics with this stuff on my hands. Something to attract them away that doesn't create any light would be great!

[dcnicholls]

The blue zappers don't work very well for mozzies, as they follow heat and CO2 (exhaled). One very expensive solution is to buy one of the propane burning traps which supplies both attractants to the mozzies and lures them into a lobster trap type net structure. These can clear quite a large area of mozzies but are very expensive.

I find tropical strength Rid works really well (even for the Canberra bloodsuckers).

[xstream (John)]

About 18 months ago while I was wandering through Mitre 10, I spotted a small battery operated mozzie repeller that will clip to your belt or hang from your key chain.

It works by emitting a high pitched tone the same as a female mozzie keeping an area of approx metre clear of mozzie's. Both Anna and I have one and find it works extremely well.

I can highly recommend this device as it works well for us

[RB (Andrew)]

Originally Posted by xstream

About 18 months ago while I was wandering through Mitre 10, I spotted a small battery operated mozzie repeller that will clip to your belt or hang from your key chain.

What are they worth John, they look interesting !

[ving (David)]

i have a couple of these but all they do is croak!
are they broken? they dont seem to be getting rid of mozzies...

[xstream (John)]

Originally Posted by Rocket Boy

What are they worth John, they look interesting !

At the time $19.95 each, Andrew.

[ving (David)]

is the buzz audible John?

[allan gould]

Bought one from Australian Geographic. Should have rolled two $10 bills together and hit the mozzies with that. Pure rubbish. Didn't work and ran out of power after 30 min.

[xstream (John)]

Originally Posted by allan gould

Bought one from Australian Geographic. Should have rolled two $10 bills together and hit the mozzies with that. Pure rubbish. Didn't work and ran out of power after 30 min.

Maybe you got a faulty one Allan?

Ours have had the same batteries in them from the start and have been used for many hours on end. They also came with a spare.

If mozzie's are about they always manage to sus me out but since using one of these neither of us have had any problems being bitten.

I can only speak from experience and we have found the item to work, if yours ran out of power after 30 Min's no doubt it wouldn't of.

[xstream (John)]

Originally Posted by ving

is the buzz audible John?

Yes but only just David you need to have your ear fairly close to hear it.
The buzz reminds you of when you have your head on the pillow and you hear a mosquito coming in for the kill.

[ving (David)]

that gives me the creeps just thinking aobut that sound jonh!!!

[JimmyH155]

Those electric sound producing "Scare off the females" zappers have been around for years . They are IMO as effective as those razor blade sharpeners they actually sold in Europe (little plastic pyramid aligned with the moon or some such rubbish). I find the best is to use those inexpensive green coils that you light and then blow out the flame. Probably does wonders for the lungs, but at least seems to keep most of the mozzies away