Each week, like clockwork, a Mosquito Control employee stops at my house and sets up a mosquito trap; the next day, she comes back to collect the trap and see what it contains. Apparently this week she found plenty, because this morning there were FOUR M.C. employees scouring the immediate neighborhood to find possible breeding sites. They told me that while the trap caught only two Aedes aegypti mosquitoes (the dengue fever vector), there were 150 Culex quinquifasciatus mosquitoes inside the trap. Obviously, the former will be able to breed wherever the latter is, so M.C. wants to find those places before rainy season.
One suspected place was my cistern, but when checked, it was found to be "clean." I know my gutters are OK because they have rusted through in the low places where water used to collect. I cannot help but wonder if breeding isn't going on in the cemtery. M.C's response to my query always is the same, "We put tablets in every flower vase once a month." But, could there be a cement burial container that is cracked and holding water in the cemetery somewhere near my house?
It is said that the city once smashed in many of the cisterns in town, so maybe there is one such cistern under a neighbor's house that the current owner knows nothing about. Mosquito Control is doing a terrific job trying to figure all of this out, so please be helpful whenever its employees are poking around your house.
Thanks, Rob Sprogell
No comments:
Post a Comment