Insect repellent and sunscreen for kids 1 and 3

Hi Dita,

If you want a non toxic Insect Repellent solution, a mixture of 50% baby oil and 50% dettol works reasonably well. Both these products can be bought at any Supermarket, or Chemist shop.

For the best solution, nothing is as good as Bushmans, available in both small and larger aerosol packs, or a plastic tube style dispenser. Most good camping stores will stock these. This product protects you from everything including sandflies,(Midgies) which can be quite annoying at certain times of the year.

As well as Insect Repellent, perhaps consider an anti-insect mesh which completely covers the head. Also available at Camping stores.

As for Sunscreen, I don't think you will do better than the UV brand SPF 30+ available from Chemists. The 2 hour rating applies easy and readily disappears into the skin. The 4 hour rating is more heavy duty and takes considerable rubbing before it is absorbed. Both are water proof so you won't need to reapply if the littlies get wet.

Hope you all have a great time touring Northern Australia.

Dita,
As above is good but just make sure that whatever insect repellant you buy has at least 20% DEET which is the active component.
alastair

It seems DEET is OK to use on young children:

Site Link

So I'd suggest Aeroguard Tropical Strength don't know about sunscreen.

Mike Harding

Hello Dita

there is a product here by Johnson and Johnson called OFF it's pleasant smelling and I use it on my kids and seems to work well. There are a number of high DEET content ones that work well but I didn't use it on my kids and I didnt like the idea of them.

There are many sunscreens on the market especially for children, all work well, the one I used last summer was called KIDS and it was fine.

Enjoy your time in Australia, the Terrtory and WA are magic places.

cheers

Lyn

We use Aeroguard Tropical Strength spray (light blue can) and also one in a purple can by Rid. Our kids are 4.5yrs and 2.5yrs now. Being in spray cans it's easy to apply and maybe even a light spray on the clothing instead of the skin, of course the downside of spray is that it's more likely to be inhaled. We have used Off Skintastic in a small pump spray bottle, it was effective and smelled good but I found the pump bottle didn't work properly after a little while.

There are a few different ones on the market to choose from, and apart from making your own as someone else suggested I would choose ones that have lower concentration of deet or try some of the more natural ones (probably not quite as effective).
For yourselves the Bushman brand is generally the strongest (for example the 80% deet plus sunscreen tube) but I probably wouldn't use it on the kids.

You will find a variety of sunscreen available on the shelves and most would be fine for the kids, just get whichever you find easier to apply. I've got a little roll on bottle myself which seems to do the trick well.

Enjoy your time in the Top End, it's a truly great place.

Hi Dita

Always make better clothing you first choice.

This includes repellant impregnated clothing.

Robin Miller

forget about all the rest and get bushmans. im one of those people that are extremely mozzie attractive. ive tried everything, if i go to an outdoor party sometimes no one else gets bitten but me!!! on our honeymoon to thailand (in the wet season) i took both "off" and "bushmans". "off" is a great product and usually works for me (80% of the time) but nothing got me whilst using "bushmans". we even went on a 4 day mountain hill tribe trek and slept in the villages, and still nothing.

in so saying this, there is a word of caution. during the night i reached over and grabed my pen torch (aluminium case with some sort of plastic paint on it) and in the morning the paint had melted off where i touched it after applying "bushmans". so if i was you, i would get the bushmans in the aerosol pack, as its not as strong (deet) as the tube, but works just as well.

the mozzies they have there will dislocate your shoulder if they land on it. but the bushmans proved their match. i was actually directed to it by my doctor who spends a great amount of time trekking through these sorts of country's!

shannon