Eating Outdoors: What Do You Do About the Bugs?

I love alfresco dining as much as any romantic but even as I dream about cold roast chicken and seven-layer salad under a big tree, I also have to wonder: but what about the bugs? Mosquitos, flies, midges, gnats, no-see-ums and (classically) ants are bound to show up at most outdoor meals. So how do you deal with them?

* Fun fact: Bats have been known to eat up to 1000 insects in one hour!

(Image: Reddish)

Categories: Kitchens, Insect & Pest Solutions

Posted by Dana Velden

Dana Velden is a freelance food writer. She lives, eats, plays, and gets lost in Oakland, California where she is in the throes of raising her first tomato plant.
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Comments (9)

Hilarious dress!

I wish I could have picked multiple answers on this survey...

I absolutely love my screened-in porch but we have bats at our house too. They swoop out at dusk from their house ready to eat all the 'skeetos they can. When we picnic we do the repellant thing (sometimes natural...sometimes deet... depends on how voracious the bugs are)... and I've found that a brimmed hat really helps. Mosquitos, black flies and no-see-ums don't like to fly under the brim.

I have little netting caps that go over each plate of food. I absolutely love them. They're not only really cute, they're also very practical!

The best are the coils, though they seem very poisonous...

The bugs where we live are tolerable until dusk, so we eat outside but don't linger. My parents use citronella candles, though.

Citronella plants are good. I plants them in pots and bring them during the winter.

One option you didn't list was time of day. I never eat outdoors in the evening because that's when the worst of the bugs are out. I do lunch barbecues and picnics for that reason.

Here ticks are also a problem and citronella doesn't repel those so deet it is. I have no desire to contract Lyme disease.

Fun picture! I actually have found that bugs don't like wind so I set up a fan or two. In hot weather, the diners, are happy then, too.

http://danamccauley.wordpress.com

We are lucky in New Mexico bugs aren't really a problem. I never notice them when we picnic.