Koolatron MK14FE Mosquito Trap Cordless 1 Acre with Octenol

I don't know what the other reviewers were doing with their units, but ours worked incredibly well. My wife and I were being eaten alive clearing brush and trimming trees. I read an excellent online post about controlling mosquitos, which is how I found out about this method of controlling them. Have a read if mosquitos bug you! (http://forums2.gardenweb.com/forums/load/organic/msg0902095927829.html) Our unit worked well for about 5 weeks, then the mosquitos came back. The propane tank was empty! As soon as I replaced it, the mosquitos were gone again. Counting the number of bugs in the trap is a waste of time. I seldom had lots in the trap, but the mosquitos were definitely gone for the entire area we were working in – around an acre. If you want live mosquito free, use this unit. John

I've read the reviews complaining of poor plastic parts, and I concur that the details of the design aren't perfect and the assembled product is a little "loose". I spent a little time reinforcing a couple of key areas which made a big difference. The wheels are also a bit too close together for it to roll easily without the chance of tipping over. I think the newer version of this product corrects some of these problems. However, in terms of the feature I care about most - its ability to trap mosquitos - it does very well. I have used a competitive product for a couple of years and the Bite Shield Guardian is definitely superior in terms of mosquito trapping performance. I think some people get hung up on exactly how many mosquitos are in the trap basket. The real measure of performance is whether or not the area around the rap is mosquito free, and by that measure, this unit has been performing well. If a trap captures a high percentage of mosquitos before they can reproduce, then the future population is reduced so the basket doesn't always fill. I found the unit to be easy to start. It also has a safety feature that shuts off the burner if the unit tips by more than 10 degrees. This can be a bit annoying when moving the unit over bumpy ground, but overall, the safety aspect of the flame shutting off if the unit were to tip over is good feature. Also, because the unit is so easy to restart, the safety feature isn't that big of a deal. Overall, I do recommend the unit - it definitely traps mosquitos.

The instructions leave a bit to be desired and the fit is somewhat loose. That being said, it has killed hundreds of mosquitos and the black sticky panel was completely covered by Yellow Flies after 2 days. I scrapped them off and it covered over again after about a week. I have just added some more sticky "Tanglefoot" to it and expect results to continue to go down, as the breeders are wiped out. Any other year, we would have to fight our way down to the river. But now, we can walk and have very few bugs bother us!!! It is well worth the money and time to use it.

I brought this product after seeing too many negative reviews with other competitors such as the Mosquito Magnet and after having returned a defective Skeeter Vac 3000. My hope was that someone in this industry should be able to design a reliable and effective product. Not seeing any reviews on this product I took as the "glass is half full". After receiving it I went thru the steps of assembling it. The first thing I noticed was that 2 of the holes in the main support pole had been milled and the other 2 hadn't. The pin used to connect the pole to the base support wouldn't fit even with the milled holes. A question I had: Was the milling done by the companies manufacturing or was this a return that someone tried to make work? If the former, then they did a poor job of getting it to work. If the later, then it's poor sales since I was under the impression this was product was new. Not to be deterred I tried to connect the mosquito head to the pole. This wouldn't fit as well! OK... enough banging of my head against the wall. I returned the unit.

I was very disappointed in this product. It did not work at all. The assembly was easy enough however after 7 days it only caught 3 mosquitos.