WHAT CAN I PUT IN RAIN BARREL TO KEEP OUT MISQUITOES?

[red dirt shootist]

Bleach

 

[CHenry]

Gold fish

 

[jtmcglothin]

Vegetable oil or chlorine. They both work.

 

[264killer]

Thanks again.

 

[TwoForFlinching]

I put mesh over my barrel. Still let's the water in, keeps out the bugs

 

[RickN]

Goldfish

Or minnows

Just what I was going to say. Friend has a concrete horse tank that holds about 50 gallons. Keeps a couple goldfish in it to take care of the skeeters. One of them has gotten big over the years. Almost koi size now.

 

[Glock 'em down]

We put Miracle-Gro in ours and water the garden with it.

 

[Deer Slayer]

A squirt of Dawn soap will break the surface tension and not allow the mosquitoes to hang at the surface and breath. A good mixture of Dawn and water kills all kinds of bugs as it encapsulates them and they suffocate.
I spray wasp nests with it after dark and they drop to the ground, wiggle a bit and die. They can't breath coated with the soap film.

 

[BillM]

Goldfish

Or minnows

Minnows won't eliminate them. Not unless you put an unsustainable number of minnows in the drum. Dad's water barrel had mosquito fish, gambusia affinis, IIRC, and there were always mosquito larvae in it. They couldn't keep up with the number of mosquito larvae though they ate bunches of the little monsters. It will help, not gonna fix the problem. Mosquito Dunks kill the larvae, and are supposedy safe for fish. I'd do both.

Dunks weren't available back then.

 

[KOPBET]

Not all dunks are made equal. Make sure the ones you buy contain BTI and very little else. Some can be mildly toxic to humans, fish, soil.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4014730/