Vitamin B and mosquitoes.

Newsgroups: alt.folklore.herbs
Subject: Take Vitamin B2 to Repel Insects?
From: sapienza.umcc.umcc.umich.edu (Sam Sapienza)
Date: 11 Oct 1995 14:49:21 -0400

I'm planning a week of scuba diving in the Bay Islands off of Honduras over Thanksgiving. I'm told that the bugs there are horrific. No-see-ums attacking the ankles, etc...

I'm also told that if you take Vitamin B2 it will help to repel them.

Can anyone confirm this to be true?
What dosage is needed and how long in advance of the trip to begin taking?

From: sjaqua.ix.netcom.com (Scott Jaqua )

> No-see-ums attacking the ankles, etc...

If I may make a suggestion, I've talked to people that wore a flea collar around each ankle, and they said that it works to keep the no see ums off the ankles.

From: Jon Mitchell <mug.perth.otago.ac.nz>

> I'm also told that if you take Vitamin B2 it will help to repel them.

I haven't used v-B12 myself but I have seen numerous others who have. Guiding in New Zealand's Fiordland (where "sand flies" have been known to carry off sheep) I met plenty of US hikers who had been mega-dosing on B12 for months before their trip. There seemed to be absolutely zero difference between the number and severity of bites between those who had used B12 and those who hadn't.

Probably of no use what so ever - just another observation from downunder.

From: pete.mudhead.uottawa.ca (Pete Hickey)

>I'm also told that if you take Vitamin B2 it will help to repel them.
>Can anyone confirm this to be true?

I had heard the same thing. I wasn't too sure about the number, though, B2, B12, whatever, so I took some B--complex which had all of them. I went for a day, and, sure enough, I didn't get many bites at all.

Then I thought, maybe this was just a light bug year. So the next day, I didn't take the B*, and guess what? I didn't get many bites either.

But then I thought that maybe that day was a supre light bug day. I had no *real* control. I devised an experiment.

I broke the vitamins in half, and swallowed them on my left side while lying on my left side, to make sure they stayed on the left. I stayed like that for a while to make sure the vitamins went to the left, and not the right.

Guess what? I didn't get any fewer bites on either side.

Conclusion: For me, the vitamins did nothing other than making me piss bright yellow.

-pete

P.S. the bright yellow piss *was* effective for killing bugs when aimed at them.

From: hawkeye.gate.net (Bill Dueease)

> There seemed to be absolutely zero difference between the number and severity of bites between those who had used B12 and those who hadn't.

Say Hey Jon

I participated in an invitational Golf Tournament on the Milford Track, and found that vast quantities of DB Brown significantly reduced the itchyness and irritation of the famous Fiordland Sand Flies.

Of course DIMP and full clothing will help in preventing sand flies from biting.

We did see a Flying Fiordland DEER being flown away by a large mob (or whatever you call them) of sand flies, the poor thing had'nt had its monthly DIMP Dip.

BTW the No See Em's that we have here in Florida are in reality a much smaller cousin of your Fiordland Sand Fly, and your sand fly is much more aggressive. Thank God!