I used OFF for years as a kid growing up around the farm doing chores, and, in early fall season hunting & spring turkey season. I would still surrender a pint or two of blood to the chiggers and ticks. I also melted the LCR screen on my first bass boat while night fishing by over spraying the stuff. Who'd a thunk it'd melt plastic like that? OFF was all we had and all we knew, so we did the best we could with what we had.
After college graduation with a biology degree the first job I could muster was with the Missouri Department of Natural Resources as a State Park Naturalist. Immediately upon hiring and assignment to my park, the first need for me was tidying up some long neglected hiking and horse trails. It was summer and I knew the trail crew and I would be lucky to survive the savage Ozark chigger. Not to mention ticks. We would be exposed to these meat eating and blood sucking predators for days on end and I wasn't looking forward to the campain. Especially the "pain" part. As I was rummaging around collecting the gear for the trail crew I ran across a case of Permanone. I had never heard of the stuff at the time. When I inquired about it, a sage old timer from another park filled me in. WOW, what a godsend! I can remember marveling each evening at how relatively unmolested I was after a long day in the brush. I've never had need to look elsewhere since that time years ago for chigger/tick protection.
