De-bugging yourself...bug repellents?

[hardtack1864]

Re: De-bugging yourself...bug repellents?

Someone sent me an email this winter about skeeters and bananers. It said that if you eat the bananers the skeeters won't try to eat you. I've yet to try it, but if it works, you might want to try this instead of garlic. Unless of coarse your girlfriend or wife likes you to have stinky breath.

Bananas I think bring skeeters to you and not keep them away, but that is what I heard.

[Silas]

A nonchemical suggestion - drawers

Surprized no one has mentioned this yet. Tuck your drawers into your socks, then tuck your shirt into your drawers. The ticks may still work their way up your pants, but the layer of drawers keeps most ticks honest. If you don't tuck your shirt into your drawers, they'll just crawl onto your exposed chest. It's not a perfect solution, but neither are any of the period or nonperiod chemical methods.

As for those tiny chiggers, I understand prayer works about as good as any period method. Thankfully, we don't have to battle them here in the Pacific Nor'west. Our local menace is the vicious, leopard slug. It's not unusual to see a slime trail in the morning which leads towards an open haversack.

Cracker, anyone?

[ElizabethClark]

Re: A nonchemical suggestion - drawers

Mark--Ick.

(I suggest carrying ducks to eat the slugs--then you eat the ducks, and try not to think about what proteins were converted, and when.)

Back to Bugs: If one wishes to use camphor, head for a healthfood store and get essential oils, rather than perfume-grade oils. Essentials oils can be cut with other oils, or used full strength, or doused on a bit of cotton wool and tucked into a sachet (like a camphor bag in the previous post).

Adding garlic doesn't necessarily mean bad odors--when you eat enough of it, often enough, you won't actually smell of garlic, though it still comes out through your perspiration. And there are worse smells on a campaigner than garlic--and what the heck would a girlfriend or wife be doing kissing a campaigner during an event, anyhow??

[Spinster]

Re: 1863 bug repellent

From "Resources of the Southern Fields and Forests" F P Porcher, Charleston, 1863

"Hedeoma pulegioides, Pursh. Pennyroyal; tickweed. Grows in the upper districts, and among the mountains of South Carolina; abundant in Spartanburg, S. C.

U. S. Disp. 365; Bart. M. Bot. ii, 165; Lind. Nat. Syst. 276, and Flora. Med. 491; Griffith's Med. Bot. 508; Raf. Med. Fl. i, 231; Bart. Veg. Mat. Med. ii, 165. A gently stimulant aromatic, given in flatulent colic, and sick stomach; also as a stimulant diaphoretic in catarrhs and rheumatism. The warm infusion is a convenient and useful prescription, which is largely employed in popular practice in promoting the menstrual discharge. It is said that the plant, or the oil extracted from it, is an effectual remedy against the attacks of ticks, fleas, and mosquitoes........."

Today, oil of pennyroyal is commonly available from various herbalists. A drop or so on a small piece of fabric will repel insects from you, and will discourage moths when stored with your jean wool uniforms and blankets. Don't rub it directly on your skin--a drop on each sock, each cuff, and the back of the collar is sufficient. It should always be properly secured and excessive amounts should not be handled by women of childbearing capacity, as it is a known abortifactant (as noted rather discreetly above).

[kemper_rifles]

Re: A nonchemical suggestion - drawers

Adding garlic doesn't necessarily mean bad odors--when you eat enough of it, often enough, you won't actually smell of garlic, though it still comes out through your perspiration. And there are worse smells on a campaigner than garlic--and what the heck would a girlfriend or wife be doing kissing a campaigner during an event, anyhow??

Right you are, not necessarily bad odors, but bad breath certainly. I was just under the assumption that the garlic would be eaten at home and not at the event, but then again the world is a sick and twisted place.

Like I said, I have no idea if bananers really work, but its worth a try for the sake of your significant other unless of coarse your significant other is the one eating the garlic like some folks and stuff, I reckon.

[2RIVB]

Re: De-bugging yourself...bug repellents?

Honestly, with mosquitos, you just have to tough it out. Not much works to repel them. If I remember correctly, they are drawn to the CO2 you exhale, and that escapes from your skin. I don't think what you eat will make much difference. I was once told by a skilled outdoorsman I know, that taking a dive into a lake will repel them. For some reason, he said that lake water repels them. I have not tried this, so I can not vouch for this as sound advice.

[C.G. Williams]

Re: De-bugging yourself...bug repellents?

Garlic Pills (scented), you can get them at your local pharmacy, along with Vitamin B and E. Take these pills and you should be bug free, I have taken this arrangement for a year and I have come up few mosquito bites, and I have had no ticks on me.

[The Pigman]

Re: De-bugging yourself...bug repellents?

I have always found that a good quantaty of Pipe Smoke keeps most of the vermin away. Try smoking just before bed and blow some on your bedding and inside your tent.

Thanks,
Mark C. Foster

[10nycav]

Re: De-bugging yourself...bug repellents?

I've done some experimentation with various period bug remedies. The advice about tucking shirts into drawers, socks into drawers are certainly good. During time spent in Costa Rica I wore my trowsers bloused and dusted my socks with sulphur powder. Never got a chigger bite one. Then again I did try, whenever possible, to avoid the tall grass where the little devils most liked to hang out. some of may compatriots, however, were severely infested.

Wool clothing, especially if of tight weave and worn somewhat loose, will keep the probing proboscises of mosquitoes off of most of your skin area. Definitely a good argument for wool. I have never tried the pennyroyal extract on clothing but think it's worth a try. For sleeping arrangements, I cover head completely with a wool blanket. I'll take that "stuffy feeling" to the music of mosquitoes any day.

I have certainly noticed that tobacco smokers seem less bothered by mosquitoes than non-smokers. If I could never get away from mosquitoes I am certain that I would take up the habit. I also noticed for my own part, that if I could avoid scratching my first few mosquito bites, over a couple of weeks I seemed to develop somewhat of a "tolerance" for the bites and they would not swell and get itchy. If I scratched enough to raise welts, all was lost. Having dipped in lakes I can tell you the mosquitoes attack a wet person even more avidly than a dry one. The old Indian remedy of bear grease seemed quite ineffective also. I find it better for cooking than as a salve. I would suspect that onions, as well as garlic, would be helpful in making one less palatable to insect life, although it would take a higher dose of the onions to have the same effect.

Ken Morris
10th Regt of Cavalry NYSV

[cante]

Re: De-bugging yourself...bug repellents?

bear grease and red ochre may spook the anglais and make you look good, but it does _nothing_ to keep the skeeters at bay... but a rubdown with ferns does seem to confuse them a bit... at night being wrapped in a fetal position with just a breathing hole is often the best you can do... sweat or swat, your call...
had an ambush blown last season because the mosquitoes were relentless and the movement was seen... such iis war...

[marine05]

Re: De-bugging yourself...bug repellents?

I don't know all the time I've spent in the field, during real life deployments and reenactments I have come to believe that nothing works very well for very long. Most times at reenactments I tuck my drawers into my socks, keep pretty well covered and at night use the armor of my gum blanket. Chiggers, read some reports of northern soldiers first experiencing them out side Vicksburg, nasty little creatures once you get them, difficult to get rid of. I'm more worried about the skeeters than ticks. More equine ensephelitus (sic) and West Nile Virus carried by those flying stickers than lyme by ticks here in the mid atlantic.

The one thing I have noticed is that the longer I go without bathing the less the bugs bother me.

s/f

DJM

[billwatson]

Re: De-bugging yourself...bug repellents?

co2 from your breath and a tad coming off your skin are the attractor for mosquitoes. Wood smoke seems to be the only thing that bewilders them -- it puts massive amounts of CO2 in the air, diluting that which you are putting out.

Ever wonder why, when you cover up everything but your face at night, the mosquitoes find your face? It isn't just luck, you're putting out a smokestack-like trail of CO2 downwind, with every breath. It's like a homing beacon.

Nobody has mentioned gnats. I'd rather have 10 billion mosquitoes than any gnats at all. Ever try to paint a boat hull when the gnats are out, which they always are in May when it's time to paint boats? I got more paint on me than the hull, swatting at the little buggers around my eyes and ears.

Bill Watson
Stroudsburg, Pa.

[RJSamp]

Disagree strongly Curt

" Modernisms are best left for other fora. Please do not post modernisms and reenactorisms such as:

Deep Woods Off
Cutter's
DEET
Avon Skin-So-Soft "

This becomes a SAFETY issue of Modern reenacting Curt. 'They' died by the hundreds (at least in one Northern Regiment based on the Carolinas coast) from being bitten by mosquitoes, drinking bad water, etc. They also fired live ammo in anger and pulled ramrods on battlefields, and fixed bayonets and then marched quickly over rough terrain.

This is reenacting, theater, a hobby, and some of us have jobs and family to get back to on Monday. Considering how sparse Sunday afternoon attendance at events are (with many closing shop early on Sunday to allow for the drive home), this might be an accurate observation.

I would advocate a small bottle of DEET in you personal gear, next to your contact lens case, anti-allergy medicine, Ephedrine shot for anti-bee sting, and other modern items that even authentic campaigners carry DISCRETELY on their person at events.

LYME and other insect borne diseases (the Plague) are not to be taken lightly. I would personally hate to be at the end of a LawSuit from someone who was prevented from carrying a few ounces of modern stuff at an event where a inspection rejected the medicine...and then was bitten and suffered pain/suffering/debilitation/death because of it....or went into Diabetic shock or had a heart attack, etc.. Them brown recluse bites are NASTY.

now having said that (and I personally carry DEET and a contact lens solution case per night on my person at ALL events)......here are PERIOD solutions to the problem that I follow religiously:

1. tablespoon full of vinegar daily for a week before the event. If the event doesn't issue vinegar (which was a regular issue item) then I take a small bottle with me. It's a vitamin C/antiscorbate thing, as well as makes bad meat taste great...mix it in with diced onions for example...

Speaking of Vinegar, it's great for horses digestion and anti insects as well!
Gallon in a 250 gallon water tank. a cup sprinkled on a flake/armful of hay daily kinds of stuff is excellent, and Period.

2. garlic tablets daily for a week before the event....bring a couple extra with you, they are brownish colored and don't look that out of place amongst roasted coffee beans for example. Take two while you are cooking up your bacon in the dark on Friday night.

3. Not for campaigning, nor the faint of heart...but a dish of honey laced with Arsenic....attracts and kills flies by the thousands. We used to place this up high in the horse barn so the cats couldn't get into it.... and if it killed a few sparrows it meant less targets for the Daisy Rifle.

4. Ever notice how there aren't any fire ants around chiggers....(or is that the other way around).

5. flap of canvas over your upper body at night, tuck the edges in, allows you to breath and keeps the mosquitoes from biting exposed neck and face.....cloth doesn't work as they'll bite right through a cotton shirt/piece of cloth.

6. Folded huck towelling around the neck is good (think Charlie Sheen in Platoon).

7. don't camp near breeding places....modern tires, stagnant pools of water, swamps and marsh. In the summer, camp where a breeze can sweep 'em to someplace else (ridge top).

Anyway, I don't think the goal of the hobby is to suffer a potentially life long disease to be 'authentic'. Or to put us 'at risk'. Diseases and health issues arise (or decline) cyclically over time, as well as evolve. Polio, rabies, leprosy, cholera, typhoid, yellow fever/malaria, plague, TB, etc. all faced by the average ACW soldier. Herpes, AIDS, many forms of cancer not faced by them. Even STD's strength and reaction to medicines change over time....but you wouldn't advocate unsafe authentic period sex would you? :wink_smil

The ground, air, food that we come in contact with/inhale/digest is largely different than back them. Strontium 90, etc. have changed all that irrevocably. Our immune systems are set up for the long haul, and have been changed since birth from what they were accustomed to. I don't think we need to tamper with it for three days to be 'authentic'.....because we still won't be (tough to get rid of all those child hood vaccines, tetanus shots, fluoridated teeth, etc.).

So I'll carry my DEET. And an authentic flask.

at authentic events.

Thank you.

RJ Samp

[Curt Schmidt]

Re: De-bugging yourself...bug repellents?

Hallo Kameraden!

"Modernisms are best left for other fora. Please do not post modernisms and reenactorisms such as:

Deep Woods Off
Cutter's
DEET
Avon Skin-So-Soft "


Gentlemen:

My above instructions as a Moderator were simple and abundantly clear:
Please do not post modernisms and reenactorisms here.

They were intended to keep the discussion in a CW Period historical context.

They were NOT instructing anyone to:

1. Violate safety procedures and medical protocols.
2. To put themselves at personal mental health and well-being threats, physical health and well-being threats, or bodily harm, risk, or danger.
3. To cause people to experience safety or medical problems.
4. To cause people to substitute my Mental Picture or Judgment for their own, at any time or place.

I did not state or share my personal Mental Picture, or my personal "CW Hobby" approach and level of intensity and application on these issues, concerns, or practices. Such was not shared or discussed.

I did, as Forum Moderator ask that modernisms and reenactorism not be posted here as they are beyond the scope and purpose of this Forum being common sense in the first place, and "findable" on other CW as well as "Modern Camping" as well as medical info websites (for those so interested).

Unfortunately, however, I see the instructions as a condition of keeping this thread "up," were ignored- and ignored with seemingly arrogant, "in your face" postings that smack strongly of Militant Farbism."

There seems to be personal side-thread going on here along the lines of "Curt, you rabid Super Authentic, how dare you tell us to subject ourselves to disease and affliction in the name of History and the H/A segment of the CW Hobby? I am going to do what I want."

I am not telling people any such thing. I have politely asked them NOT to post modernisms here. Although some replies here contain very useful and practical modern information, they are not within the scope and purpose of THIS forum.

As Dr. Phil's Life Rule #1 reminds us: "You either get it, or you don't."

I am sorry, but this thread is closed for failure to follow instructions, overt defiance, and Militant Farbism.

Curt-Heinrich Schmidt
Forum Moderator