It’s an always-unwelcome summer invader – the pesky mosquito.
The City of Regina has started to treat standing water with an organic product.
Ryan Johnston, the city’s supervisor of pest control, talked about the sampling and treatments for the skeeters on standing water. Each batch of mosquitos needs to be treated.
“We’ll treat that puddle, that puddle will dry up, (and) when it rains again, we’ll have to treat that puddle for mosquitos again,” Johnston said.
When they treat some standing water, it will take a day for the mosquitos to consume the organic product called Vectobac. Those are attacked by ground crews and argo crews.
“It’s carried with a corn husk, so we throw these granulars into the puddle, Some sink, some float. It covers the entire water column, so we have ground crews in and around town and also we have argo crews for larger areas, longer stretchers and they have a blower attached to the back of the argo and it blows this product into the puddles as they’re going down the water body.”
The product the city uses will kill mosquito larvae within 24 hours. The city has also started weekly monitoring of mosquitos using 12 traps across the city.
It’s a big job right now because of all the rain and subsequent standing water that is the traditional skeeter breeding ground. And the city isn’t only concerned the mosquito eggs that stayed dormant in the winter.
“Eggs can be dormant up to 10-15 years,” Johnston said. “So large rains, big spring floods will wash into areas and those eggs that have been sitting there are hatching now, so we have to get to each of those puddles and treat those.”
As for what people can do in their own property to battle the flying pests, Johnston offers suggestions.
“Proper drainage of your yard is very important, especially in spring,” he said. “Later in the summer, we want to have a better look at those bird baths and standing waters in old swimming pools or tires or whatever you have laying around the house. Make sure that’s checked and emptied. Rain barrels should have screens on them so mosquitos can’t lay eggs in the water.”
The mosquito that spreads West Nile Virus, the dreaded culex tarsalis, doesn’t often appear until later in the summer.
Results from the mosquito survey are at regina.ca/mosquito.
