Hosting an outdoor gathering? Or just enjoying some fresh air on your deck? Either way, mosquitoes can make spending time outdoors in the summer an agony, especially at dusk or after dark. The itchy welts their bites leave behind are enough to keep you indoors. Not to mention the diseases they can potentially carry! But there’s no need to kill off these problematic pests with chemicals. Try out these tips to naturally repel mosquitoes and bask in the beauty of your backyard again.

Let Your Landscaping Naturally Repel Mosquitoes

Plenty of plants naturally repel mosquitoes, so add them to your garden or place them around your patio. Rosemary, basil, and lavender are aromatic herbs that mosquitoes dislike. Not only do these plants keep the pests away, but they add beauty to your garden and flavor to your cooking. Citronella, lemon balm, catnip, and marigolds are other plants that naturally repel mosquitoes.

Make Your Environment Less Appealing to Pests

Build a few bat houses. Give these creatures a happy home and they eat what bugs you. Bats dine on mosquitoes during dusk, reducing the population in your yard.

Remove any standing water. Bird baths, empty flower pots, buckets, and kiddie pools create great breeding grounds. So do clogged gutters. Make sure areas in your yard that are prone to puddling have proper drainage. Flowing water won’t attract mosquitoes, so you can keep any fountains or moving water features.

Get Personal

What you wear is an important factor in attracting mosquitoes. Stay away from beauty products like lotions and hair sprays that attract pests. Replace these items with ones that are unscented or feature scents that naturally repel mosquitoes, like lavender and rosemary.

Use your outdoor wardrobe to ward off pests. Wear light colored clothes that provide plenty of coverage. Darker colors and bright floral patterns attract mosquitoes.

Home Remedies to Repel Mosquitoes

Make your own concoctions to repel mosquitoes using essential oils. Peppermint, lemon eucalyptus, tea tree, cinnamon, and geranium oils work well when you mix them in a spray bottle with water. Or add a few drops to olive oil and rub on your skin. Never place undiluted essential oils directly on your skin because they can irritate.

Create your own traps with dish detergent. Mix dish detergent into a few shallow dishes of water and place around your patio or deck. Mosquitoes use standing water to breed, but when they land in this dish they get stuck in the detergent and die.

Call Us

Don’t let these blood-thirsty bugs keep you inside this summer. If these natural methods to repel mosquitoes aren’t enough to keep the bugs at bay, call in an expert. Contact Free Spray Lawn Care at 419-529-5296 and we’ll help you ban unwanted pests from your backyard.