TravelTalkOnline Forums Travel and Vacation Forums British Virgin Islands Mosquitos and bugs

Hello,

I'm a first-time traveller to the BVIs and going to go bareboating this December. In terms of mosquitos and bugs I have following questions:
1. Should I expect loads of mosquitos in December? We plan to anchor in bays mostly.
2. What repellent works best in the BVIs? (any favourite brands?)
3. Do you use mosquito/bug nets on sailing yachts? (isn't that quite unhandy?)
4. Are there any hotspots where these little beasts become rampant? (any no go areas?)
5. Any other tricks and tips to keep mosquitos and bugs at bay?

Thank you for sharing your knowledge and experience!

At anchor or a mooring ball we never see mosquitos. The worst is on land at dusk, other than that no worries.

Mosquitoes get worse after rain, and November is, statistically, the rainiest month. But this year could be dry, who knows. The government has been trying to eliminate breeding spots because of an increase is dengue fever. Mosquitoes will always be worse in wet, low-lying areas with a lot of vegetation. If there’s a good breeze, mosquitoes are not a problem. December can be windy, but again, who knows.

Sand fleas are another annoying insect. They are prevalent on beaches, especially at dusk.

We like one of the deet-heavy sprays; some people swear by the bracelets. Long sleeves and pants help.

Off sells foil packs of deep woods off wipes. One wipe is enough to take care of ankles and exposed skin for two adults when eating ashore on the beach in the evening. You can find these stateside in most drug stores. Because they are wipes there is no problem with TSA.

We've been sailing the VI for many years. I don't know that we've ever seen a mosquito out on the boat either sailing or at anchor/mooring. However - we still come prepared and bring a can of spray with deet just in case.
On land is a different story - mostly sand fleas at the outdoor restaurants.

We sailed a few years back in May and had 0 issues, and I'm a mosquito magnet. On land we had dinner one night at Pussers on Marina Cay and the mosquito's/sand fleas were absolutely horrendous. It became a running joke in the restaurant there were 3 cans of Off and everyone was passing them table to table. We all got a good laugh out of it and ended up meeting some nice people from Iowa!

My son is a magnet for mosquitoes and we will see absolutely no mosquitoes on the boat but he will wake up with mosquito bites all over him! We joke that we bring him along so that we don't get bit! Things that have worked for him are the Picaridin lotion (you get it through Amazon) and the Off Wipes. With the lotion you only have to apply it every 8 hours but it is pretty potent stuff. Lots of precautionary statements on the label. The worst place we have experienced for noseeums/sand fleas is Trellis Bay on shore. They are brutal and way more aggressive than mosquitoes.

If you are on land from dusk on, assume sand fleas will greet you. We haven't had any problems at anchor or mooring with bugs, aside from the occasional critter here or there. We did notice that wet towels/clothes were an attractor in the evenings - maybe keep those away from gathering areas. We switched from DEET to Picaridin about four years ago. We use the Sawyer spray and found that we only need it on our legs in the evening on land. Of course, everyone will have different results, but we found it worked the same as DEET and it was much easier on our skin and gear. I can't count how many items of fishing, diving, or other gear I've smudged up with DEET melting the plastic. And it is easier on sunburn

We have always used a high concentration of Deet (80%) while on Anegada. The melting of plastic and what it may be doing to our skin a huge concern. For Picaridin, do I look for the same percentage? Or what percentage of Picaridin are you finding to be sufficient? Since we will be sailing soon I assume we should be looking at wipes instead of spray?

One lesson we learned was "just because there is an open mooring ball near the dinghy dock, doesn't mean you should take it".

At the Pirate's Bight we jumped on a close ball thinking we had a nice score. No wind equals random orientation on the ball and bugs. Random swinging put us closer than I wanted to be to the randomly swinging boat behind us. Better to stay a little further out, enjoy the breeze, avoid the bugs and have some fun trying to find your boat in the dark.

Dave

We use the deet wipes readily available at REI on our ankles and feet before heading to shore in the evenings.

One tip....especially for the person whose child get bug bites overnight....he is likely bringing them into bed with him and then they feast. We ALWAYS dip our feet/legs up to about our knee into the water before stepping onto the boat from the dingy. no-see-ums wash off and you dont bring any aboard.

Good idea if you are at a villa as well - we always use the outdoor shower to clean off our shoes and our legs (or jump in the pool) after a day at the beach.

We get the lotion (not spray or wipes and easy to travel with) through Amazon. In fact I just got my bottles today for our trip in November. The brand we get is Sawyer and it is a 20% combination of Picaridin, Methylpropl and Piperidine Carboxylate. I'm sure none of those are good for you either but it does stop the bugs. At least we are using reef safe sunscreen and we do try to wash off the bug spray before going into the ocean, although on the boat the wash water eventually ends up in the ocean anyway.

We use the 20% Picaridin from Sawyer and it has been on par with the heavy DEET formulas we used in the past.

Perfect. Thank you. I will order mine today. It looks like we will miss you by a week. Have a great time!