Sawyer Products Premium Permethrin Clothing Insect Repellent Trigger Spray

I bought this to treat my hiking clothing to help against mosquitoes mainly, and I definitely get very few bites when wearing clothing treated with this. I also bought it hoping it may keep away black widows and brown recluse spiders, and I didn't get any spider bites last year. I was bit a few years ago by a black window and it caused a large patch of skin on my leg to go necrotic and itched for over a year! Hopefully something as simple as this will keep them off and save that discomfort. This bottle says it's enough to treat 8 items and treat each item with 3oz regardless of size, surface area, or absorption. I think that's a pretty broad number, and I you can vary how heavy you lay it on. My hiking shirt and shorts are rather small and thin and I ended up using less then 1/6th(4oz) the bottle for both. It remained effective for about 3 weeks hiking with a lot of sweat and a few washes. This product dries clear and is odorless afterwards, although you'll want to apply it in a garage or with good ventilation. It also adds very little weight to clothing afterwards, my shirt was 73g before applying and 80g after it dried.

A year ago I took up hiking. Experienced hikers all warned me about ticks. While others last year had their problems with ticks, bites and infections, I must have been lucky to not encounter any/take home any in my over 700 miles of hiking. Not this year. I'm guessing the mild winter has left us with an abundance of ticks. This stuff works. On a hike this week I was inundated with flying ants, flies and other bugs. Those that landed on me immediately fell off and went into convulsions. Great product. Follow the directions carefully when applying. Don't get it on you or in your eyes. (Wear disposable gloves; spray close to the fabric.) Hang the sprayed items out of doors and out of the sunlight to dry.

I purchased 2 bottles of this product for my month long trip to Guyana (Located in South America). I used this product and mosquitoes were unfazed by it. Product advertised that mosquitoes would be kept away for 45 days. Within one day, the mosquitoes returned. Having read that this product was effective in Zimbabwe I thought Guyana would be smooth sailing. Not true !! If it wasn't for 3M Ultratron I would have contracted some serious mosquito borne disease. Product didn't work for me. Maybe it is effective in the US but it certainly wasn't in Guyana. The mosquitoes in Guyana are vicious; if I applied repellent on my hand and missed a spot less than the size of a US quarter,these critters would bite me on the very spot on my hands without repellent though 95 % of hands has repellent.

The description says "Is Permethrin dangerous to my skin? The warning labels on the cans or bottles are often misunderstood. Your skin metabolizes, or breaks down Permethrin within fifteen minutes of contact with skin. Therefore, it is of no value to you as a personal protection insect repellent when applied to the skin. In addition, the EPA precautionary statement, "Do Not Apply to Skin" indicates that Permethrin is ineffective when applied to skin; therefore, do not apply to skin." IT DOES NOT ANSWER THE QUESTION POSED: IS IT DANGEROUS.

This stuff worked like a charm. Mosquitos of the jungle variety would land on my pants and quickly fly away, and I mean quickly. It was lovely. My friend was bothered all day long in the jungle with her normal clothing, but not me. It was worth the extra time I took to proof my clothes with this stuff. No odor either and the fabrics didn't change after being doused and sprayed. It even seemed leeches didn't come close to me either because my entire wardrobe was doused. I did, however, start to feel a little bad, actually. I felt like a toxic human walking through their jungle repelling them. But, overall, it was worth it though. I do recommend this for all the wonderful, far-reaching places you may travel to.

As a sportsman in Massachusetts I am always worried about ticks. We have a lyme epidemic up here. So I wear this on my camo when deer hunting. Seems to work well, but its hard to spot ticks on camo. Since we can't hunt on Sundays I do some scouting typically. I wear lite colored cloths so I can spot ticks easily. I still treat them with this stuff. So one sunday I'm out and I manage to pick up 6 or 7 ticks in a short walk. They are crawling around on my left pant leg. So I decided to watch them for a few minutes to see how this stuff actually worked. Much to my surprise they seemed unbothered by it. Not a single one fell off. I waited a couple minutes before flicking them off myself. So that was kind of a disappointment to see. But I've never had to pull a tick off of me after hunting... So perhaps its working at some level. But its not like the you tube video where they fall off within seconds.... not even close. they still have ample time to attach if they find bare skin. I've also seen mosquitos land on my camo during a hunt and they don;t seem bothered by it either... Sometimes they sit for 20/30 seconds before flying away... they certainly don't "fall off and die" I do use scent control sprays - not sure if that reduces the effectiveness. But I didn't spray scent control on that day scouting and the ticks still had no problem with it - so who knows. Lastly this product isn't as "odor free" as they say. After treating the clothing does have a chemical smell. But it goes away after the first wash... But be advised - if your a hunter - you should expect to have to wash your camo in scent free / no UV brightener detergent before heading out. Good luck out there!