A NATURAL MOSQUITO REPELLENT
By: Kendall Monroe
When travelling or staying at your favorite beach resort or cottage, the mosquitos can be infuriating. In addition to the constant buzzing, landing, and squashing those pesky, blood thirsty creatures, the itchy bumps they leave are unsightly. If only there was a natural mosquito repellent. A natural mosquito repellant, not simply organic, but something that we could ingest, or something that didn’t hurt our skin, or feel sticky or kill the wildlife.
Our staff went on the search for the ideal natural mosquito repellant. Our criteria was that of the most natural ingredients, the kindest to our skin and the best for the wildlife.
What we have discovered was rather surprising, but obvious once we thought about it.
The natural mosquito repellant lay right in our very own garden, without even realizing it.
Here is what we discovered; the more pungent the herb, the better it works as a natural mosquito repellent and biting fly repellent.
Our favorite was the lavender, but we found rosemary, lemon balm, peppermint, and less familiar to our more modern gardens, catnip, yes, it is a plant, citronella, yes, also a plant, and pennyroyal, and old-school lovely blossom. We also found that garlic and chives work well, although very, very pungent and not only wards off mosquitos, but friends, and little children, too.
Whilst out in the garden we simply picked the flower with the stem and petals and rubbed it directly on our exposed areas. That was the fastest means of protection as we found we were being eaten whilst trying to find the right means of topical aide.
We also discovered that placing the herbs, stem, flower and petals into witch hazel (also a plant), and baby oil and let steep for 2 days, also worked and made lovely gifts. Although, it needs to be noted that one must shake the mixture and then spray.
The most wonderful aspect of this natural mosquito repellant is that anyone may pick it directly from the garden, no waiting, no biting and no itching!
Feature Photo by: Jacqueline Macou
