Your best bet is Skin So Soft or if you prefer an OFF product, Off Botanicals does NOT contain DEET and does ward off the nastie bities.....including no-seeums!

This months' (June) Consumer Reports has ratings on a large variety of them. Not surprisingly, the products with the highest % of DEET scored as best repellents. Still, I'm bringing my all-natural substance Cactus Juice, which family members had good luck with in Costa Rica....with heavy duty DEET stuff as back-up.
How'd you like to be a Consumers Union volunteer for THAT test?? Ouch!

Over the years I have tried a variety of "non deet" mosquito sprays. Mostly they made me smell strange and attract dogs and other lonely animals. You also might be asked to leave indoor parties when wearing "skin so soft". Most had no effect on biting bugs.

I tried a 100% deet product and felt like a toxic waste dump. But I had no bites.

I now use a product with about 20% deet with great success.! !

Most long term tests clear deet as a carcinogen on adults. We use a 7% deet on smaller children but need to reapply every hour or so.

The newest reports say use deet 20% and reapply every few hous of exposure..

The Consumer report tests seems good, read it and make your own decision.

The non-DEET products also do nothing whatsoever to repel bugs on me. I am a total bug magnet. If it bites, it will make a bee-line for me. I used Cutter 8-hour backwoods formula spray, which said it was also water repellent (can't vouch for that), and it worked very well. Plus it had no offensive smell (no smell at all, really). One can lasted me 9 days (including sharing it during 5 days of camping).

Whatever you buy, make SURE you read the label and that it specifically says that it repels no-see-ums. Otherwise, it may repel mosquitoes, but in my opinion the no-see-ums are a much worse problem.

If you're out for dinner, haven't brought your repellent with you, the bugs start biting and the establishment has no bug spray, have the bartender give you a paper towel doused with cheap gin and swab it on yourself.

You'll momentarily smell like a gin mill but it does work!

Different approaches work for different people. I have had zero success with non-DEET products, and I have tried a variety of them including those sold on island.

SO, my last trip I took Off 100% (actually, I think it's about 98%) DEET and, for the first time ever, had absolutely no bites. I only applied it late in the day and figured that using it for one week was not going to kill me. I would _definitely_ have some on hand as a back-up.

Ladies, please note - if you are wearing polish on your tootsies you should cover your toes up or spray your hands and then apply. In aerosol versions of Off, Cutters, etc. whatever the base that the product is dissolved in will damage your pedicure.

I also recommend that anyone ask their physician for a prescription of Diprolene lotion (.05% solution) and get it filled. If you do get bit it's the only thing that "takes the edge off" for me. It's generic now, so the price is not awful and, trust me, it's worth every penny.

Look up the effects DEET has to your body and you might think twice before using it. Skin So Soft works - trust me on this, I was absolutely NOT a happy camper with no-seeums! And you DON'T smell medicinal to boot! Not really a lather it on kinda guy, but heh, anything to keep the tiny biters from getting a free lunch!

I don't know if you have bugs where you live, but if you do, the same stuff that you use at home will work in the Caribbean. Actually I've had a worse time with mosquitos in my back yard, with green head flies on Cape Cod and with blackflies in Vermont than I've ever had with bugs in the VI.

Skin-So-Soft is a placebo.

Hi,

My sort-of-scientific .02......................

Just this past Sunday night my husband and I sat out on the beach until 6:30 P.M. I have not stayed out on the beach this late in a very long time, because the last time I did I was DEVOURED by noseeums. It was just awful. So bad that I was afraid that I was going to have permanent scarring from all of the bites (silly me:))

Anyhow, this time I used Cutter Skinsations with 7% Deet and it worked great -- not a single bite. It has Aloe and Vitamin E and the smell isn't very strong either -- about as much as a scented hairspray.

A Virgin Islander told me about an herb called Neem. I didn't trust that it would repel the bugs, even though it claims that it will. I used the 98% Deet stuff that I found at Walmart in the sporting goods section. The Deet stuff is nasty. It takes off nail polish and my feet ended up black because it took the color out of my sandles, but I didn't get bit. I went without bug spray a couple of nights that we had dinners by the ocean and paid for it with itchy bites the next day. I used the Neem Tree Farms Deet-Free Botanical Outdoor Gel on my bites and it took the itch away. We have been using it at home with our Wisconsin misquito bites and it works for those too. I ordered my Neem stuff from the link below but I think you can find it at health/nutrition stores.

http://neemtreefarms.com/catalog/index.php?osCsid=aad23f7ac189233329420fe8a4931fdc&cPath=40

Different people have different body chemistry. Non-DEET products work great on some people, and not at all on other people. Yes, DEET is kind of a scary substance, but if you're only using it for a short time, it's probably better than coming down with dengue fever, some other tropical disease, getting an infection from scratching bites, or just plain being uncomfortable on your vacation.

Bottom line is....find out what works for you at home, and then take that to the Caribbean. (Although I stand by my earlier statement about being sure it repels no-see-ums. Not all of the DEET formulas do that.)

I hadn't heard of Neem being used in a topical repellant. There are many properties on STX where Neem trees are planted all around the house to repel all kinds of insects.. flying, crawling, you name it. The trees have small green leaves and small green "fruits" hanging... like a smooth skinned berry or very small nut pod. They don't have an obvious odor as you walk around them, but the bugs don't like them.

I think I will give the Neem repellant a try. We tend to use the "family" version of the Off repellant. It has a fruity scent that isn't exactly delightful, but it's better than the medicinal scent of most other repellant sprays.

oh gosh, I just had to reply- good luck to 'ya. Last trip to STJ in November- hubby stayed bite free, I got killed, despite no fragrances and girly stuff. Nothing worked well except: 1) keep the sand, all sand off your body, towels, flooring, towels, flip flops etc, 2) bathe in DEET or something like that, 3) use Skin So Soft as a room spray (in other words, its the placebo mentioned here), 4)pray, 5) who cares, the VIs are the best, the bites will go away (easier said after you get home) 6) go anyway and love it

NOT! It really did work and I needed something to work! It really did, and a little research on no-seeums told me why it worked.

Skin so soft works!