I have the kind of blood mosquitoes love. I’ll be at a backyard cookout with eight other people and I’m the only one getting eaten alive. Citronella candles did nothing. Bug spray made me smell like a chemical plant. Then a gardening friend told me the real trick — and it has nothing to do with spraying yourself.

Mosquitoes need standing water to breed. Eliminate the water and you eliminate the next generation. A single bottle cap full of water can produce dozens of mosquitoes. It takes about a week for eggs to become biting adults, so breaking that cycle is everything.

The five-minute yard sweep

Walk your yard and dump out anything holding water. This sounds obvious but the places they breed are not obvious. Clogged gutters — mosquito heaven. A saucer under a flower pot. A kid’s toy left in the grass. The folds of a tarp. A birdbath that hasn’t been changed in a week.

I found mosquito larvae in the drip tray under my grill. The tray I had not emptied since last summer. It held maybe a quarter-inch of water and it was absolutely teeming with wrigglers. I dumped it, scrubbed it, and my backyard mosquito population dropped noticeably within two weeks.

Change birdbath water every three to four days. If you have a rain barrel, cover it with fine mesh or add mosquito dunks — those little donut-shaped things that contain a bacteria toxic only to mosquito larvae. Safe for birds, pets, and plants.

Plants that actually repel mosquitoes

Citronella plants exist but they are not the silver bullet. The oil needs to be crushed and rubbed on your skin for any real effect — just having the plant sitting there does almost nothing. Plants that actually help: lavender, marigolds, rosemary, and catnip. Catnip is especially effective — a study from Iowa State found it was ten times more effective than DEET at repelling mosquitoes, though you’d need to crush the leaves and apply the oil.

Plant these around your seating area. They won’t eliminate mosquitoes entirely, but combined with the standing-water sweep, they make a real dent.

The one gadget I actually recommend

A box fan. Seriously. Set it up on your patio and point it at where people are sitting. Mosquitoes are weak fliers. They cannot fight a breeze stronger than about 1-2 miles per hour. A box fan on medium creates a wind barrier they can’t cross. Plus it keeps you cool. Two problems, one cheap fan.

I was skeptical until I tried it. Now I bring the fan out for every cookout. It works better than any candle, coil, or zapper I’ve tried — and it costs pennies to run.

• Eliminate standing water: Gutters, pot saucers, toys, tarps, grill trays — dump weekly
• Change birdbath water: Every 3-4 days to break the breeding cycle
• Plant barriers: Lavender, marigolds, rosemary, catnip around seating areas
• Box fan: Creates a wind barrier mosquitoes can’t fly through