No see um's sound nasty!

I have read and heard a lot about these nasty little no see um's (also known as punkies and biting midges). They come out at night and early morning in the tropics and literally bite a chunk of flesh out of your skin to get at your blood. The bites are irritating, painful, and can cause long-lasting painful lesions for some people. You will feel that something is biting, but the person suffering can not see what it is. That sounds mighty painful and I can imagine right now that I would be up all night trying to figure out a way to get rid of them.

So, I have decided to be a little proactive on the bug front. I am making screens for our hatch and companionway door out of the screen farbric that are no smaller than a 16-mesh. We are using a thin board cut out the shape of the companionway and gluing the fabric in between. Then I will paint the board white to match. We are putting on a hinge on both sides in the middle so that it can fold in half and be stored under our bunk when not in use. I hope that our plan here works. The only problem that we see is that the board material that we used won't be strong enough.

We have also heard that the Avon lotion "Skin so soft" works well at deterring them. I happened to find a bottle of this in my bathroom drawer that has been there forever. Never liked the stuff until now. If it works I will love the stuff.

 

 

 

Cheers, Shawnae