Skeeter Beater

VICTORIAN WHISPERS SASSY SPRINGS FARM

TESTIMONIAL

To whom it may concern,

Before a recent twenty-eight day safari in Tanzania with the Robin Hurt Safari Company my PH (born and raised in East Africa) e-mailed me to "try and get hold of something called Skeater Beater" because of circulating rumors that it repelled tsetse. A little research revealed that Skeater Beater is from Virginia, as am I, and that it is made of lavender, which I like. As for lavender's chances against tsetse, I rated them about like a Daisy Gun's against a Cape Buffalo, but I obediently bought some anyway.

The Daisy Gun killed the buffalo. Or stopped it, anyway. Skeater Beater is pleasant, as said lavender, liquid in a spray bottle. Its ingredients seem singularly innocuous (no DEET, which is lucky since tsetse's simply adore DEET). It would be nice to say that it repels tsetse’s right out of the safari car. This it does not do. Tsetse’s can still annoy if you wear Skeater Beater.

But they very, very rarely bite. A tsetse seems to need to remain on the skin for several moments before it bites. Actual contact with Skeater Beater seems to be very unpleasant for tsetse's--they normally move on. The incident of bites seems to fall by a ratio of ten or fifteen (my poor PH) to one (me, naturally). That is the result of a two day experiment in a riverine environment in southern Tanzania, where tsetses were terrible. On the third day the control in the experiment (my PH) removed himself from it and started using Skeater Beater himself. On previous safaris I have suffered badly from tsetses--so this is no personal immunity.

Tsetse bites are, of course, unpleasant. They can also result in serious allergies (hives), confining the victim to tent. Even this is not to mention Sleeping Sickness which, when contracted, is a good deal worse than malaria--enough said. I strongly endorse this product and would not consider going to a tsetse area again without it.

And guess what? It repels mosquitoes, too! Does it deal with Cape Buffaloes? I don't know yet.

Francis O'Neill , Windsor Farm