Gadgets

Mosquito Trap

Introduction

At a recent breakfast outing, Estelle mentioned that she had bought a mosquito trap at Pick and Pay, which used light rather than a poison to trap and kill mosquitoes. This appealed to me as the smell from the pads used in electric mosquito repellant mat heaters (such as this one from Checkers) mess around with my sinuses (and probably my health as well).

There are several versions of this trap available: the Pick and Pay one mentioned earlier; Takealot; Dischem; Clicks; and a slightly different variant available from Takealot.

We bought the one from Dischem as the store is convenienly close to us, and the price was right for an experiment.

Does it work?

The device works by emitting a blue light to attract insects. A fan just below the enrance to the trap creates a downdraught which sucks any insect that flies into the light into the trap. The fan, together with the design of the trap prevents the insect from escaping (the fan may also damage the insect as it passes through the fan).

I tried to take a pic of the trap in use, but the lighting really got the better of me. This is the best I could manage, so hopefully you will get a feel for the intense blue light emitted by the device.

The power consumption of the device is really low. Neither my AC power meter (when powering the device with a cellphone charger) nor the Jackery's built in power meter could measure power out to the device. A Xiaomi 10000mAh (about 37Wh) power bank ran the device for five nights with the power bank still showing between 25% and 50% of its charge available. This meant the device used between 1.85Wh and 3.7Wh per night.

As you can see from the pic above, after seven days one moth, one fly and two mosquitoes were caught.

Estelle has had better luck with six mosquitoes trapped on one night.

Final thoughts

The very low power consumption is a big plus point. However, the fan is rather noisy and the light is very bright, so it is not something you want next to your bed (I have placed it just outside the door of the bedroom). The success rate of the trap is not very high, with mosqitoes still botherimg me at night.

Would I recommend it? Probably not, but I may change my mind as summer progresses - I do have the device, so I will continue using it.

(updated: 20 December 2024)

Update

I have now used the trap for four weeks and I probably have to revise my opinion. During this period, I have been monitoring what has been caught every week. So far, 20 mosquitoes, 2 flies, 1 moth and 1 miggie (gnat) have been caught.

Some useless stats after 30 days:

• 83% of insects trapped were moquitoes;
• 0.67 mosquitoes were trapped per night.

The odd mosquito does still bother me on some nights, but I feel that there is an improvement in the number of times that I have been woken up by their buzzing around my head!

(updated: 9 January 2025)