I’m wondering about ways of keeping flies and mosquitoes out of the house while being able to leave the kitchen door open so my animals can go in and out of the back yard. I bought a pair of those Magic Mesh “screen door” thingies, but haven’t put them up yet. Amazon reviews of the Magic Mesh option weren’t that great.
Have Dopers found other options?
Would a beaded curtain keep out-- or at least minimize the influx of-- bugs? Provided I can find one that doesn’t have a big fluorescent peace sign on it… but then, that would also keep unwanted people out, right?
Hmmm… just had an idea: maybe a sheer fabric curtain held up by a tension rod? The animals can push through it, and when it gets ratty, I can just throw it away and put up another one.
It’s a rental house and I’d rather not approach my landlord about a doggy door if I can come up with something else (as I have some other, more important requests to make of him). We’ve had such a mild winter in South Texas that I fear we will be up to our ears in fleas and mosquitoes this year.
We just use screen doors, but the animals can’t open them, which is inconvenient. What aboutmosquito netting? You could make a curtain out of it, and it would allow good airflow and light transmission.
Thanks, Renee. I do have a screen door, and I generally leave it standing open a bit, too.
I used to have a cat whose whole mission in life was to get to the other side of whatever door he was on… as long as it was closed. An open door was just a bore and not in the least challenging.
I remember seeing a t-shirt one time that had on one side a picture of a cat sitting at a screen door looking up at the viewer with the caption “Cat wants out.” On the other side of the t-shirt was the same cat sitting on the other side of the same screen door with the caption “Cat wants in.”
Would the landlord let you replace the screen door (and keep it) while you’re living there? Lowe’s sells a decent but cheap screen door that you could install a pet door in pretty easily.
When/if you move you can have the original door put back in.
I installed the Magic Mesh screen curtain thingy, but I didn’t attach it to the wall. I folded over the top and stapled it to make a rod pocket and used a tension rod to stick it in the doorway, thusly.
