By Scott Taylor,Staff Writer

The Brown family’s mosquito magnet lasted one week before it was back in the box and returned to the Paris Farmers Union.

It did work, Ann Brown said. Her husband regularly emptied the white net of dead and desiccated mosquitoes.

But it didn’t seem to reduce the swarms. The bugs were as plentiful and as hungry as ever. And the bites just kept on coming.

“We had it about a month, give or take a few days, and it just never lived up to its potential,” she said.

It’s a common complaint, said Jim Dill, a pest management specialist at the University of Maine Cooperative Extension.

“The thing is, it collects a lot of mosquitoes,” Dill said. “That makes people scratch their heads. It’s got to be doing something, but the bugs don’t seem to go away.”

The trap is not a guaranteed fix, Dill said. The best bet is to try many different things – and wear lots of bug repellent with DEET.

“If the ultimate goal is to reduce bug bites, use repellents and limit your exposed skin,” he said.

The magnets use mosquitoes’ sensitive noses to trap them. The insects normally float high above the ground, sniffing the air for carbon dioxide, the telltale trail of a warm-blooded mammal. The magnet uses propane and an artificial hormone to simulate those smells, luring the bugs in. There, they are trapped in a net by a small fan – and die.

Placement is crucial, Dill said. The traps act like beacons, drawing mosquitoes from all around.

“You need to be sure you don’t put yourself between the trap and the mosquitoes,” he said. “If you do, they’ll feed on you and then get caught.”

Timing is just as important. The traps work best if used early in the spring, before the first mosquito of the year begins buzzing around.

“If you get the early ones, you have a good chance of making a difference for the summer,” he said. “If you put it out now, when there are bazillions of mosquitoes around, I guarantee you’ll be saying it doesn’t work.”

The magnets are just one in a long line of weapons people have used to ward off bug bites, with limited success. Citronella candles and torches mask human smells, hiding them from mosquitoes. Pesticides kill them, along with all other flying insects. Biological allies, such as bats, birds and dragonflies, are fickle. They can’t be counted on to cut down the swarms and they can bring their own problems, including rabies and West Nile virus.

Brown has tried them all. She even had a black-light bug zapper for a few years.

“It was great as entertainment, but it didn’t stop the biting,” she said. It killed mostly moths and the occasional June bug.

Brown’s current favorite is a contraption that uses a small propane tank to send out a fog of heated bug repellent. Her husband used the fogger daily for about a week to chase the flying pests away from the backyard shrubs and ponds. He treats the yard every couple of days now, and it seems to be keeping the mosquitoes at bay.

Dill, of the Cooperative Extension, recommends taking neighborhood action, working together to get rid of standing water, to place mosquito traps and to spray for bugs.

Otherwise, there will still be plenty of them around.

“If you’re out there by yourself, spraying or putting out your mosquito magnet, you’re better off just slathering on the DEET before you go outside,” he said.

The yard arsenal

Household weapons in the war on mosquitoes:

Propane-based trap

How it works: Attracts mosquitoes, black flies and other biting insects with a mixture of warm carbon dioxide and hormones and traps them in a net until they die.

Pro: A new technology that works well, quietly and with few environmental concerns. Some machines can keep an area up to one acre skeeter-free.

Con: Expensive – small machines can cost up to $400. Mechanism is fragile, can be temperamental and repairs are expensive. Uses a propane tank running 24 hours a day, so keep it away from open flames, barbecues and kids with sparklers.

Bug zapper

How it works: Ultraviolet light lures flying insects to a spectacularly explosive death.

Pro: Pesticide-free, and you can hear and see when it works. No maintenance or cleanup and no nets to empty or tanks to change.

Con: Noisy, and it sprays the immediate area with a fine aerosol of bug pieces – not only gross, but can be unsanitary and unsafe.

Smoker/fogger

How it works: Kills or repels flying insects in the immediate area.

Pro: Clears the area sprayed for at least one evening.

Con: Pesticides can be worse than bugs for people with asthma or allergies. They wear off eventually, and the bugs come back.

Citronella

How it works: Masks human scents, hiding people from mosquitoes.

Pro: Few environmental impacts. Some people like the smell and it gives the backyard a dramatic, torch-lit look.

Con: Wander away from the tiki torch and become an instant target.

Ultrasound

How it works: Uses high-pitched sounds to drive pests away.

Pro: Sound isn’t audible to human ears, so it shouldn’t bother anyone.

Con: Doesn’t seem to bother the bugs, either.

Bats

How it works: Put up bat boxes and lure the flying rodents to your neighborhood to eat up bugs at dusk.

Pro: A natural way to battle the bugs.

Con: Bats can bring rabies with them.

Birds

How it works: Put up feeders and plant landscaping designed to bring more birds to your backyard.

Pro: Some birds are prodigious mosquito-eaters and can significantly cut down the population.

Con: Mosquitoes bite birds, too, and that’s how West Nile virus spreads. More birds in your backyard means a greater risk of the disease.

Dragonflies/damsel flies

How it works: Buy mail-order larvae to eat up the mosquito population.

Pro: Dragonfly nymphs really go to town, decimating mosquito larvae.

Con: Illegal to import without a permit from the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries. Out-of-state versions can be considered an invasive species.

Sources: University of Maine Cooperative Extension Pest Management Office; Maine Board of Pesticide Control; Maine Department of Inland Fisheries; Municipal Pest Management Services, Inc.