Bug shirts, light colors, brimmed hats, and the ParaWing VCS
Bug shirts, light colors, brimmed hats, and the ParaWing VCS
We definitely use bug clothing.
We use the same sort of bug jackets you pointed out YellowCanoe. This is us modelling the fashions that are de rigeur in late spring/early summer in these parts. We use the cotton versions because they breathe reasonably well, though they are a pain to dry out when they get wet from portaging through wet woods.
I'm glad Shearwater mentioned the difference colors make. During bug season, I wear very light colors. I first discovered this difference on extended camping trips where I had two colors of pants - one dark, one light. Black flies and mosquitoes would find me sooner and swarm around me in far greater numbers whenever I wore either black or navy blue pants. My off-white or beige pants were much better. I just wish they made canoe packs in lighter colors. My next backpacking pack is going to be a light color as well if I can help it.
I've had people remark that in my photos and videos I look like I'm walking around in pajamas because I wear very lightweight, light-colored, loose-fitting pants and shirts and hat, but those light colors really do make one less eye-catching to bugs.
I'd also strongly emphasize the wearing of a brimmed hat. Here in Canada in late spring we have black flies, who love to land on your head and bite your scalp. A hat is pretty much a must even when the bugs are not out in force, or you'll end up with dozens of blood-encrusted little wounds on your scalp by the time you crawl into your sleeping bag to sleep. Later in the season, deer flies, horse flies and stable flies come onto the scene...and a brimmed hat completely confounds them. Their instinctive preference is to land on the head or back of the neck for their blood meals where most animals can't seen them land nor brush them off. But if you wear a brimmed hat, they will harmlessly buzz around over your head, above the brim, looking in vain for a place to land. You can walk around with a cloud of them above and even on your hat and seldom will one dip below the brim to where it can get you. A regular peaked ball cap won't work. You need a brim that goes all the way around. And it's important to remember that this peculiar effect of a brimmed hat only works on the species I mentioned. It makes no difference to mosquitoes or black flies.
And if you know someone who really suffers from bug stress and uses that as an excuse to not go camping, there is a really terrific tarp and mesh system sold by Eureka called the ParaWing VCS.
I can think of no other piece of gear that has more greatly improved the quality of life around camp than that for me, my wife and my friends. It makes it possible to go camping even at the absolute height of black fly season when it would otherwise be a miserable experience. I have a video review of it for any who might be interested which I made this past April, just before the bug season started. Here's the link:
http://youtu.be/poLB_a1Qci8?t=1m8s
Hope this helps,
- Martin