For eight years, Diane Andrews was a prisoner in her own house, kept inside by the swarms of mosquitoes and sand flies that invade her Queens Cove neighborhood. But life changed in May when she and husband Bob Andrews bought a Mosquito Magnet. Now about 30 residents of the North Hutchinson Island neighborhood have purchased the machines, which are slightly smaller than a gas grill but use the same propane fuel. The payback is thousands of dead sand flies and mosquitoes that breed in nearby salt marshes and buzz around Queens Cove houses.
Users have to change the propane tank about every three weeks.
The Mosquito Magnet converts propane to carbon dioxide and uses octanol, a chemical formed when animals exhale. The device is sold by American Biophysics Corp., which tested it at the Vero Beach laboratory. People have tried dry ice and tanks of carbon dioxide. The unit is self- contained, with no electric cords or batteries. Others feed fish in home tanks with the insects.