Para’kito mosquito repellent review

As we mentioned in the contest thread to win a Para’kito band, we’d be doing a review of this product when we had a chance. We had two good days to test it in mosquitoville (my back yard,) and have been pleasantly surprised by the results.

As a reminder, you have a few more days left to enter to win a Para’kito band.

We were given three bands to use. Nobody who had the bands reported being bitten, nobody next to the people with the bands reported being bitten. Nobody in the general vicinity of the people wearing the bands were bitten. Skeeters were seens

Test one was in my backyard, which has defied both Bug Free Backyard, and some harmful mosquito poison I sprayed. Nothing worked this year, most likely due to some standing water in a trench out back and perhaps a bad batch of the spray.

I’d been bitten, which is absurd as mosquitos hate me on general principle. Everyone else was a series of bites after visiting my backyard.

With slightly overgrown grass we had a pool party (it had been raining, I was lazy). Three adults were given the Para’Kito bands and were basically on the perimeter of the children playing in the pool. Nobody got bitten.

Test two involved tubing on the Duck River the next day I believe. I wasn’t present for this test, but three out of five or six involved wore the repellent, I was told nobody got bitten. Also a fairly impressive feat.

The bands themselves are little more than a holder for the diffusing pellets, and the pellets are, judging by my nose, citronella and something else. Whatever it is, it seems to be working.

The bands are listed as safe for little ones on the Para’Kito site, although if they started gnawing on the diffuser you’d probably have a seriously upset stomach so keep them out of the reach of the littlest.

The bands don’t have to make contact with you in order to keep mosquitos away. You can hang one on a stroller and it’s whiffy enough to encompass the occupants, judging by our bite-free baby pool party.

Something to note however is if you despise citronella, these things will be a you-repellent. They have an odor. For most people who tried them this is not an issue. For me it was fine as long as I was moving but started building up if there wasn’t wind blowing on me. Three of these open sitting in a room at my house is kind of odorific.

That said, you can keep them outside once opened, and it appears to work for mosquitos pretty well. It didn’t do anything, however, for these things that are confused for mosquitos in the south (Crane Flies,) however they don’t bite as far as I know. It also didn’t repel a particularly tenacious spider, but I didn’t expect it to either.

Overall, on day 1 and 2 of long use, the Para’Kito performed admirably. Several days later into the advertised 15 days, the bands still smell as strong to me.

So, if you’re looking for a bug repellent that doesn’t have to contact skin, is safe around children, and appears to work after getting doused soundly, you’ve got it.

I’ll keep my spendthrift comments to myself, but the price is a bit on the hefty side with 30 days of refills being listed at about the same price as you can get a band plus two refills. However, if it’s worth it to you to never have the repellent touch your skin and be able to go in and out of the water without diminishing effectiveness, it is probably worth it.

You can get a Para’kito band and two refills for $16.49 on Amazon

Update: at day 8 in a completely mosquito ridden backyard two out of three people wearing the devices ended up with one bug bite each. The non-wearers looked like they were getting eaten up even with spray on.