Hunting season is here, and I am not part of the hunting crowd…. yet… But this year, my hubby was ready on opening day with all of his gear. Walmart asked us to highlight some of their hunting gear, and write about a must have item. I asked my hubby to take this one on, since he really enjoyed working on the Labor Day post with the tree stands. I figured, he’d be the one that could write about it best, from experience, so without further delay.. Here is his must have hunting item… The Thermocell.
It doesn’t matter where you venture outside in the southern United States during the summer or fall, you’ll always be guaranteed to see insects. There are many different techniques people use to try to keep the inspects away including insecticides to homeopathic recipes to shoving dryer sheets in their pockets. I’ve tried many of these methods all with varying levels of success.
As I prepared for hunting season this year, I heard a lot of opinions from other hunters about a product called Thermacell. Thermacell is product that is powered by a butane cartridge that directs heat at a small grill where you insert little cartridges of repellent. The repellent is allethrin, a copy of a repellent that naturally occurs in chrysanthemum flowers and is not dangerous to humans.
I picked up a Thermacell for just under $20 at WalMart. The device I purchased was in a small, green, rugged case about the size of a cordless telephone. I was also able to find a holster for it that includes a clip on the back to make it easy to attach to my gear or to my anchor point in my tree stand. It was quick and easy to insert the butane cartridge and slide a small blue pad into the grill.
The first time I took it out was hunting on opening day in the morning. Before sunrise, the bugs weren’t much of a problem. After the sun came out, I was instantly surrounded by mosquitos. I hate mosquitos. I quickly deployed my Thermacell by hanging it up on my harness anchor strap. I turned the switch to “on” and pressed the button 5 or 6 times to ignite the butane. If you’ve ever started a gas BBQ grill, then you are already familiar with how it works. The bugs started moving away from me, almost staying in an invisible holding pattern around my tree stand. I was amazed at how well this thing worked. It was very quiet too, after starting it – which is always nice when you’re trying to hide from your prey.
After running it for awhile, I decided to turn it off to see if the bugs would come back. To my surprise, the bugs still stayed away from me. I think the “cloud” created by the device hung around for a bit longer. As long as you’re sitting still and not moving, this device is a must have for your hunting or fishing trip.
Each Thermacell Butane pack is said to last 12 hours. I have only used mine for about 3 hours so far, so I have not had to refill it yet. Refills are available, also at Walmart in wither a 12 hour refill ($6.88) or 48 hour refill pack ($19.99).
