The May "Two-Four" long weekend in Canada is famous for cottage parties, sunburns, packs of twenty-four cold ones (from which the holiday gets it's colloquial nick-name of "May 2-4") and unfortunately ... bugs.

Depending where you live in Ontario/Quebec, you either detest black flies (mouchon noir) or mosquitoes (moustiques) at this time of year (or both actually when I think about it). This is a universal truth as far as I can tell all the way across Canada which even transcends the language and cultural differences. I have yet to find a person who likes either of these pests. Some people joke that the provincial bird of Saskatchewan is the mosquito (because they can carry off small cats in that province), but I'm pretty sure any of my friends from Saskatchewan would be glad to see the demise of the mosquito.

Deciding to escalate the war against these miniature beasts brought me to pause in front of the Mosquito Magnet in our local Costco.

I had read about the Mosquito Magnet on the internet a year or so ago and even seen a propaganda video, but frankly I was still very skeptical. I had in my memory some advertisement that some army base somewhere had bought a couple hundred of them after determining they were effective, but also did not trust myself as I had probably exaggerated the number from ten units to several hundred ;)

I decided to meander up to the returns desk and ask how the store was doing on returns of the Mosquito Magnet units (since this is usually a good way to find out about reliability and effectiveness). The lady and gentlemen behind the counter mentioned they had only seen one or two returned, but neither return had been for defects, only that the people had not been satisfied with the catches. They did say they have sold quite a few of them so this really wasn't the majority experience in their opinion, plus it was still early in the bug season. The lady's last suggestion was considering that Costco has a 30-day satisfaction guarantee, why not buy it and try it? "Plus Costco was the best place in town to get propane", she informed me as any good up-selling clerk would do ;-)

Ten minutes later I had a brand spanking new Mosquito Magnet and full propane tank in my car (note: good luck getting this very cubic box into your trunk - plan on the back seat if you have a sedan).

Assembly

Opening the box, it is quickly apparent these units are packaged for shipping - do not be afraid to mail order one of these as the insides are well packaged in cardboard. In fact it probably took longer to free the the 4 pieces of the unit from the cardboard than it did to assembly the structure. Basically click the stand bottom together, insert the upright pole and set the Mosquito Magnet unit on top of the pole. Le voila, unit assembled.

Next you need to install the Octenol (scent attractant) if it is appropriate for your area (and it was for mine - there is an insert in the package which explains if you should use it or not). This took all of twenty seconds.

Hand tighten the propane tank to the regulator, plug in the power cord and you are ready to go. The instructions do suggest you disconnect the propane prior to moving the unit.

One note, the instructions are little unclear about the 'Quick Clear' value and the CO2 cartridge which is not included. After reading the entire manual (like a good boy - my mother would be so proud), there was one section which implied the propane system should be cleaned before first operation. However in the quick start guide it does not mention this fact so I chose to assume the unit was ready to go and did not require this suggested yearly maintenance action right off the get go.

The only setup annoyance was that the 50 foot power cord was all twisted. I began to unwind with care, but it still required about 5 minutes of "un-threading". The suggestion is to bury this low voltage cord, but we decided to wait in order to find the optimum location for the unit.

Assembly Rating: 4.5 out of 5


Durability

The unit seems to be quite solidly constructed. The manual indicates the unit endures the rain, however you can purchase a cover on-line for when the unit is not operational. I do not believe it would survive an Ottawa winter so I am certain it will become another garage rafter storage item in the fall.

Overall it is a sturdy, stable unit. We had no problems leveling it or worry about it tipping over in high winds.

My one complaint is the power source uses a specialized plug and power convertor. Replacing or repairing this will likely mean contacting the manufacturer.

Construction: 4.5 out of 5


Location, Location, Location

We live on a 2 acre treed lot with a couple standing water ponds in the low lying areas. Mosquitoes were certainly noticeable the first summer we lived here, but thankfully they were not as bad I as feared they would be. But if you remember, in my opinion one mosquito is too many. Now that I have a daughter this opinion is even more heightened.

The package includes a CD with a PC program (using Macromedia Flash 6). The CD contains a neat little program which lets to plot out the best area for Mosquito Magnet placement. I was skeptical but it turned out to be extremely trivial to use.

Basically, on the map area you need to place:

• your house
• frequent people locations
• patio/deck
• pool
• bushes (many of them)
• standing water

The hard part was figuring out how to set the wind direction. After lots of clicking and dragging, I noticed the border had compass directions on it. Clicking on the border near West-North-West and the wind direction was now set.

Next you place the Mosquito Magnet where you want it and click "Breed Mosquitoes".

Your poor people are immediately targeted by these little cute mosquitoes which fly out of the standing water and the bushes. If you have the magnet in a good location they start swarming the magnet however and start disappearing. Very sleek little program. Move the magnet somewhere silly, your people get eaten. Move it so the patio and pool are downwind from the Mosquito Magnet and this seems to be the best suggestion.

I can definitely tell the programmer for this little game had fun. I would probably have gone the extra mile to add the occasional "SLURP - Ahhhh-EEEEeeee!" sound effect had I been writing it :)

One last neat trick - you can request "help" from the company by clicking a button which sends them your map layout and you can add a question. I have a couple tiers to my backyard and I wanted to know if it was better to place the Mosquito Magnet on the upper or lower tier. Note that I have yet to receive a response and it is now six days later so no kudos on response time.

Armed with this suggested "best" location I went and placed the unit, hooked up the propane, ran the power cord and turned it on.

Strategic Location Helpers: 5 out of 5


Operation

There is a muffin fan inside of the unit so when it turned on there is a definite hum. The sound is not really that bad, and I would say about 15 feet away you barely notice it. The noise does break into a little bit of the peace and quiet of the country however so this is another reason for having the Mosquito Magnet away from high traffic areas.

Also the unit is not unattractive, but it is a bit gangly, especially with propane tank attached.

A very nice feature is you can easily check out your 'catch' from the transparent top above the net compartment. I installed the unit around 11am which is not prime time for biting insects where I live (usually dawn and dusk are the worst times). This however did not stop me from checking my trap:

• after one minute: nothing - surprisingly (patience young jedi)
• after ten minutes: 1 black fly - (Woo Hoo!)
• after one hour: 1 black fly (whose buddies must be laughing really hard at him by now)
• after two hours: 5 black flies
• after nine hours (one dusk period): about 10-20 black flies and 5-8 mosquitoes
• at the end of the long weekend: about 30-40 black flies and 10-15 mosquitoes
• after six days: a little pile of insect husks in one corner, three monstrous mosquitoes crawling around

I don't know what I was expecting, but after nine hours I guess I was initially surprised at the black fly numbers and a little disappointed at the mosquito numbers. After six days I think I was really hoping for mass decimations, but in reality we really haven't had a terrible mosquito issue around the house so far in 2004. Frankly I am a little bit underwhelmed, but we did sit out on the patio tonight and it was at least an hour before I killed the first mosquito. If nothing else, is seems to drawing the mosquitoes to the area where it is placed. When I walked over there, I found 5 or 6 mosquitoes flying around the unit and even witnessed one being sucked up for the first time. There is even a paste of mosquitoes on the net meshing which has certainly grown significantly over the last two days.

Strangely I did notice a whack load of dragonflies after a couple hours of operation. Dragonflies are very desirable since they eat mosquitoes and black flies, but they may very well have been present before and I am just noticing them now since I was looking for bugs.

As in most things these days I am learning patience is required. The manual suggests the unit will start catching insects during the peak hours immediately and we found this to be true, but it does suggest 4-6 weeks before breeding cycles are interrupted.

Side note: Boy I wish I had one of these on the golf course the other day. They were terrible out there, but when I came back home and puttered around outside I did not notice many at all.

I do plan on relocating the Mosquito Magnet to a higher location a bit farther away from the people areas this weekend so we'll see if that improves the catch.

Slurping Power: 3 out of 5


Consumables

The unit does require two consumable inputs: the Propane and the Octenol packlets. Actually you can also consider the wire mesh net (looks like one of those permanent gold mess coffee filters, but with an auto-closing top) as a consumable as well, but I am pretty sure you can wash this pretty effectively.

The recommended replacement period is 21 days for a propane refill and a new Octenol packlet.

My first thought was "uh-oh, after spending several hundred dollars on this thing, did I just buy myself and expensive Gilette 5 blade razor" (you know, but the razor body for pennies, spend the next ten years buying replacement blades)? A 3 pack of the Octenol is listed at $24.99 US and with the suggested replacement timings, we will probably need 3-6 packlets a summer. Propane refills aren't that expensive, it's just a little inconvenient to have to refill a propane cannister monthly. It's not cheap, but if it replaces citronella candles that is one minor offset to the cost.

Time will tell also if the unit is as effective when Octenol is not being dispersed.

Operation Costs: 2 out of 5

Overall

Am I happy with the unit? Yes, but not estatic.

The statement which makes me say this is that while there still are mosquitoes, they do not drive us into the house in the evenings. The unit is still catching bugs daily so time will tell. We do live in a rural area so I am sure we will likely never wipe them out, but I am leaning toward believing the Mosquito Magnet has the potential to make an impact.

Does it catch Mosquitoes? Yup, and it traps them in the net effectively.

In our experience the Mosquito Magnet met it's claims and captured mosquitoes and black flies. Just not in the overwhelming numbers I was expecting. I am counting in 10s and I guess I was expecting to be counting in 100s, but we have also only been running it for a week so time will tell.

On the upside, every one less mosquito means one less breeding mosquito and it is worth noting we are not being driven into the house during dusk patio meals. Also, it is providing the benefit of simply drawing the swarm away from the human areas. Another bonus is that the Mosquito Magnet is an around the clock trap requiring no attendance, if nothing else it's great for this laziness factor.

This is not an inexpensive toy however and you need to justify a few hundred dollars for the unit. However with things like West Nile Virus kicking around maybe this gives a bit more peace of mind.

Value for the money: 3.5 out of 5


6 week Update

Stay tuned for results on numbers and different location effectiveness....


Recommended: Yes