How to Keep Mosquitoes and Ticks Away

Simple strategies to keep these biters at bay, plus what to do about stinging insects

By Catherine Roberts

Updated by Kevin Loria

Updated April 20, 2024

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Ideally, you’re already in the habit of using bug spray when lounging on your porch during warm evenings or hiking in the woods. After all, mosquitoes and ticks sicken thousands of people in the U.S. every year with a variety of diseases, including Lyme, West Nile, Rocky Mountain spotted fever, babesiosis, ehrlichiosis, and more.

While using insect repellent is important, doing so should just be one part of your strategy for avoiding bites from mosquitoes and ticks.

“The most important thing is to avoid getting bitten in the first place,” says Rebecca Eisen, PhD, a research biologist with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases. “Fortunately, there are really simple things you can do to protect yourself and your family.”

In this article

Keep Them Off Your: Deck & Yard Clothes
What About Stinging Insects?

Your Deck and Yard

Mosquitoes: According to the CDC, an important strategy for keeping mosquitoes out of your yard is to eliminate their preferred breeding ground: standing water. Keep your gutters clean and birdbaths, old tires, wheelbarrows, and swimming pool covers free of standing water. Clear away ivy and decaying leaves, too.

As far as your deck or patio is concerned, some spatial repellent products work much better than others. Several years ago our testers tried out two area repellents—citronella candles and a battery-powered diffuser that blows out geraniol—and found they were ineffective at keeping mosquitoes away. An oscillating pedestal fan did much better. When set on high, it cut mosquito landings by 45 to 65 percent for the people sitting close to it.

Mosquito traps that use fans, electric grids, or adhesive pads to capture and kill mosquitoes are also available. The idea behind them is generally to attract mosquitoes and kill the ones that come into contact with the traps. Experts suggest avoiding one category of these devices altogether: bug zappers. These kill bugs indiscriminately, including plenty of beneficial bugs like pollinators.

Some other types of lures, particularly those that are aimed at attracting mosquitos specifically, appear to be more useful. Researchers at the CDC have developed one kind of trap, the autocidal gravid ovitrap (AGO trap), that traps female mosquitoes seeking to lay eggs, for example, and there are a number of similar traps on the market. The American Mosquito Control Association (AMCA) notes that the effectiveness of these types of products depends on a wide variety of factors, including the species of mosquito, the insects’ population size in the area, the season, wind conditions, and more. So it’s best to consider them just one potentially useful strategy among many.

Our safety experts warn against using yard foggers or misters that spray insecticide. “You might inhale the chemicals, some of which have been linked to serious health problems, including endocrine disruption and neurological effects,” says Michael Hansen, PhD, Consumer Reports’ senior scientist.

Ticks: They like tall grass and lots of shade. So keep your lawn mowed, remove leaves and other debris, and try to let as much sun into your yard as possible. Consider putting up a fence around your property to keep out deer and other large animals that can carry ticks. Another option: Create a 3-foot barrier of dry wood chips or gravel between the edge of your lawn and any wooded areas on the perimeter of your property, which will discourage ticks from coming into your grass. And don’t forget to check your pets for ticks after they have been romping outside.

Your Clothes

Mosquitoes: Wear long sleeves, long pants, socks, and closed-toe shoes, especially when you’re out for long stretches of time. Avoid tight clothes (mosquitoes can bite through them), dark colors, and perfume or aftershave (both attract mosquitoes). Apply a good repellent to exposed skin and your clothes (but never under them). Here are a few of our top-rated insect repellents:

Person pulling up their sock. — To avoid ticks, wear closed-toed shoes and tuck your pants into your socks.

Ticks: When walking through wooded or grassy areas in the summer, wear the same clothes that ward off mosquitoes. Light-colored clothes make the bugs easier to spot if they’re crawling on you. Tuck your shirt into your pants and your pants into your socks. Apply insect repellent to your clothes and exposed skin.

Showering soon after being outside in an area with ticks is associated with a reduced risk of acquiring a tick-borne disease, as is doing a tick check. So jump in the shower after you hike or get done with yardwork, and take the opportunity to inspect your skin for bites. Use tweezers to gently remove any attached ticks. For extra protection, toss your clothes into a clothes dryer on high heat to kill ticks that might be crawling around.

Another useful strategy for keeping ticks away is wearing clothing treated with the insecticide permethrin or treating your own clothes with permethrin spray. Studies have found that outdoor workers who wore permethrin-treated clothing had significantly fewer tick bites compared with those who didn’t use treated clothes. If you wear permethrin-treated clothes, you don’t need to also spray them with a traditional bug spray—though you should still apply insect repellent to exposed skin not covered by treated clothing.

What About Stinging Insects?

“For the most part, bees and wasps will leave you alone if you leave them alone,” says Stanton Cope, PhD, a former Navy entomologist and former AMCA president.

Nests in your yard should be removed only if they’re in high-traffic areas, Cope says. If you can, wait until the fall or winter when the nests are abandoned. If you need to remove them sooner, do it early in the spring, and early or late in the day when the insects are less active. Insecticide powders or sprays might be necessary, but follow directions and keep pets and children away. Always wear head-to-toe protective clothing, and never remove nests if it requires standing on a ladder; call a professional instead.

The insects are drawn to strong scents. So to make yourself less attractive to bees and wasps, avoid using perfumed soaps, shampoos, and deodorants if you have lots of insects in your yard or you’re headed to a picnic. And because sweat can agitate bees, consider washing up before heading out.

Catherine Roberts

Catherine Roberts is a health and science journalist at Consumer Reports. She has been at CR since 2016, covering infectious diseases, bugs and bug sprays, consumer medical devices like hearing aids and blood pressure monitors, health privacy, and more. As a civilian, her passions include bike rides, horror films and fiction, and research rabbit holes. Follow her on Twitter @catharob.