The glorious twelfth is a term used usually to refer to the 12th of April, the start of the hunting season in Italy for the common mosquito (Bitius Leggius) and to a lesser extent the tiger mosquito (aggressive-bitius).
Mosquito Latin name Bitius Leggius
Experienced mosquito hunters will have a preferred weapon of choice; from the low tech ‘attempting to hit them with the flat of the hand’ to the high tech use of modified squash rackets which release a thousand volt current when applied to a poor unsuspecting mosquito.
Here we have an advanced mosquito hunter using the racket, note the clever use of a netting to catch a mosquito Credit www.oshonews.com
Hunting is not restricted to woodlands and gardens. Many households incorporate a number of ingenious devices to trap mosquitoes inside the house so that the family can hunt the mosquitoes at their leisure. They may include netting over the windows and doors or netting over a bed.
Hunting mosquitoes can also take place at night. To an Italian the pure joy of waking up in the middle of the night to the sound of the whining noise of a mosquito trapped in a bedroom can only be equaled to Italy winning the Six Nations Rugby Championship, which to date they have failed to do.
Look lads, this time next year we will win.
To ensure that there are sufficient mosquitoes to last from the Glorious Twelfth through to the 3rd of November; which is not only the end of the hunting season but also my birthday, farmers are encouraged to flood low lying fields to provide adequate water for the mosquitoes to breed. A by-product of flooding the fields during the summer is the production of rice for risotto, which the farmers sell to supplement their income. Vercelli in Piemonte is the centre of mosquito and rice production.
Mosquito farmer checking the mosquitoes will be ready for the Glorious Twelfth : Credit Thestar.com.my
In America hunters wear high visibility clothing to identify themselves to other hunters. In Italy we are a little more fashion conscience, Italian hunters therefore identify themselves by spraying their bodies with liberal doses of noxious smelling sprays. The most common odour is citronella.
David with his industrial sprayer: Credit Mosquito Squad
The monferrato area of Italy is world renown for not only the quality of its mosquitoes but also their quantity and size.
Mrs Sensible and I will be running residential courses through 2015 on:-
Safety whilst Hunting
First aid for mosquito bites
Taxidermy, the lost art of mounting a mosquito head
Wine and grappa will be served as refreshments. For more information please use our contact form
Englishman in Italy 
Oh, good! I’ll bring several of the little rascals that I’ve trapped already, for the taxidermy sessions. Maybe the season starts earlier in Tuscany?? I’ll also sign up for the wine and grappa, if there are spaces still available. Do you take MasterCard?
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Well done on trapping them. Some over enthusiastic hunters splatter them against the wall. They are then very difficult to stuff and mount. Yes we do take master card and also library cards.
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I had the netting over the bed while living in Grenada (BWI…not Granada which is in Spain) and it was great at keeping the beasties out of my bed and away from my ears….but the night a bat( small one and I’m not afraid of them) decided to venture into the bedroom caused my cat (who was under the net on the bed with me) to jump for it( the bat) and bring the entire contraption down on our heads. The bat survived but my husband almost died laughing at us (he had been in the other room).
Good luck with your classes. I hope Yvonne didn’t leave her library card in OZ.
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I bet that was hilarious. The courses are ready. I just need to inform Mrs Sensible 😉
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Can you please take a photo of your wall of mosquito heads? 😉
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The ones mounted in the hall or my prized collection of tiger mosquitos that are mounted in the upstairs loo?
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The prize collection, please 😉
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Ha ! No mossies here as my nearby Spanish river runs fast and not many people have pot plants as they turn to sticks if not watered 10 times a day 😉 My local English friend David has dozens of pot plants with trays and is bitten on his legs all the time from the 12th April onwards. Happy hunting PN 😀
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Hi Ralph, ask your friend to get in touch, maybe we could organise a European mosquito hunting competition. Or he might be interested in one of my courses
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Okay. I’ll tell Spotty Legs what you have said PN 😀
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NP I just read a most fascinating article on Yahoo news this week regarding blood types—it seems those who possess O blood types (of which I am one of the positive varieties) are less prone, almost resistant, to Malaria—-so if you are not of the type O variety, you may wish to take up G&T’s with plenty of quinine—and are not Gin and Tonics are oh so English 🙂
Just a thought 🙂
hugs—o+ cookie
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I think I am rhesus b monkey positive or was it negative with a little grappa mixed in.
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oh dear that should be PN and not NP—-I’ve driven back in from Atlanta today–hence my fried brain
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Thankfully I never get any mosquito bites not even by those pigeon sized Mosquitos in Scandinavia. However what does annoy me is that damn sound when flying around your face at night…
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I am envious of you. I am the first person the mosquitos bite. Mrs Sensible is great at killing them with the bat or even in the dark she can pinpoint them from their whine and then splat them
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Well these days I also have a great ‘shield’ as my wife seems to be a magnet for those monsters. I think her record is over hundred bites within one summer month
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Sign her up to one of our courses, if the mosquitoes are attracted to her we can teach her the ancient italian art of defensive hunting
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I would like to sign up for your courses – although I should warn you that I am almost at master level, having previously managed to kill a mosquito, in my kitchen, with my bare hand on more than one occasion. Will you be branching out and doing courses on the capture and taxidermy of wasps?
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Killing a mosquito with your bare hands is impressive. We teach our students how to stun the mosquito rather than splattering the beast against a wall. If you are already at Master level would you be interested in becoming a lecturer? Unfortunately the paperwork and associated costs needed to diversify into wasp hunting is too complicated in Italy. If only life was simple here
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For a fee (paid in flights and delicious food!) I will happily come to demonstrate and lecture on my two-handed clapping method of mosquito dispatching. 🙂
It’s a shame about the wasp hunting, but perhaps regulations will change (along with the time it takes to install a telephone line and an internet connection in Italy 🙂 ).
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Hi Elaine, I was going to edit your comment to ‘ my one-handed clapping method’ but I have promised Mrs S to behave today
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Naughty PN! 😀
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We couldn’t actually sit outside last summer because of the tiger mozzies. We’ve got the electrocuting rackets and some smelly anti-moz cream. Summer’s become a bit of a bore really!
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Loved this! Very funny. However I do think Italian mozzies are wimps compared to the African ones.
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This is true, but the Italian mosquito has a lot of style.
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Do you have a special price reduction if I sign up for a wet wooden spoon defense course too? I hate mosquitoes, but I also hate using chemical guck to get rid of them. Apparently geraniums on the windowsills keep them out. But as I forget to water them and I hate the smell of geranium leaves, it’s no good for me.
I remember being in Pavia once and wondering why there was a pervading smell of citronella in the streets. Then I say the cloud of midges and mosquitoes that were following us down the street, and I understood.
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Hi MM.
I am trying to dissuade women from attending the wet wooden spoon defense course, in the wrong hands a wet wooden spoon can be dangerous. I am thinking of running a wine appreciation club we could negotiate a price for this course.
I hate spraying chemical gunk as well, last year my training paid off and I wasn’t bit too much. My daughter looked like spotty dog after her visit.
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Maybe if you bath in wine and drink a bottle before you go to sleep you could put the mosquitoes into an alcohol-induced coma.
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Allegedly mosquitoes don’t like blood with a high concentration of alcohol. I suggested to Mrs S that I should conduct a scientific experiment and stay completely pissed through the summer months.
Unfortunately she wouldn’t agree
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I was hoping to visit Italy over the summer but needed a good reason to do so. Too bad coming for a mosquito swatting course will not hold as a valid reason since there are no mosquitoes in my neck of the woods. Let me try and think for another reason…..
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I can send you some of our mosquitoes, we have plenty. MM has asked if we will be running a Wet Wooden Spoon defence course for women with lazy or naughty husbands. If enough people show interest Mrs S may run a course.
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