Skeeters at Camp Eagle Eye
Skeeters, July 1956
The mosquito situation on the river is difficult to describe to someone from Ohio. In the hours before sunset the campers hurried to get all outdoor work done: boats tied up for the night, motors secured, kids and toys herded inside, window flaps closed, fire wood brought inside, and everyone shut up in their cabins because, just after sunset, a hum began to be heard over the lake. The hum deepened and grew louder as clouds of mosquitoes rose from their daytime resting places and flew into the night, looking for blood. Someone experiencing this phenomenon for the first time had trouble believing so much sound could come from these small insects regardless of their numbers.
Despite the screened windows and tight cabin walls, a few of the noxious beasts found their way in. (Maybe they came in through the stove, past the chimney damper.) Many nights we had mosquito hunts before going to bed. The cagey little twerps sat motionless on the walls until the lights went out and then they began their own whining, bloodthirsty hunt. We could never kill them all. Some nights Dad got up with a flashlight and went swatting and dratting around his bedroom.
We always closed the flaps on the cabin windows before retreating inside. Regardless of how mosquito-tight the windows were, it was a bit unnerving to see thousands of bloodthirsty beasts bouncing off the screens, trying to force a way in. Besides that, even after things calmed down outside, there were still plenty of mosquitoes abroad and nobody wanted to go out and close the flaps at bedtime and let a dozen in by opening the door.
Every fisherman knows that the odds of catching a really big fish increase in direct proportion to the hardship endured in getting to the fishing hole. To that end, you just couldn't beat going out on the water on a quiet evening at mosquito time.
The few times I consented to such madness I found it rather exciting. Being out in such clouds of mosquitoes and not being bitten gave one a certain feeling of invincibility. There was also the novel sight of casting a Jitterbug toward the air-glow on the horizon and watching the skeeters roll and swirl in its wake and see the fishing line descend and cut a bare swath through the swarm.
There was also a hint of danger involved. I could imagine our boat being found next morning, adrift in the weeds and our pale, desiccated bodies with hands gripping empty bottles of mosquito repellent.
Even though, in later years, the mosquito repellent (“bug dope”, in Dad's parlance) would keep the voracious little beasts from landing and biting, it didn't keep them far enough away from our faces. We breathed them in and were coughing and spitting all the time. We bought mosquito nets that covered our heads and they filtered the bugs out of our air but the screen seriously limited visibility and also prevented any little breeze from coming through.
Catching fish under those conditions was a mixed blessing. Removing a hook from a fish's mouth and putting it on a stringer washed the mosquito dope from our hands and we had to replenish it immediately. Then, cleaning fish at the fish tables by lantern light again washed off the dope and left us all bitten up and itchy. Getting into the cabin afterward let a dozen or two skeeters in with us, even after the main swarm had given it up for the night.
In the early years, the only repellent available was oil of citronella. This worked well but required frequent re-application. Later, a product called “6-12” came on the market and this was better; the bugs stayed a little farther away and one application lasted longer. Still later, DEET (AKA Ketchikan cologne) became the gold standard.
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