METAIRIE, La. (WGNO) – A biologist at Metairie-based Mosquito Control Services says this is the worst season for the pests since the weeks after Katrina. “They’re strong, they’re larger mosquitoes; compared to the southern house mosquito they can be 2 or 3 times the size,” says biologist Sam Stines.
He says the most annoying culprits right now don’t normally carry disease, but they are aggressive biters.
What’s to blame for this scratchy season? We can thank the late October rain event that happened as a result of Hurricane Patricia.
“We didn’t get the wind effects but we did get a lot of the rain; an average of 8 or 9 inches and that activated a lot of sites that are what we call floodwater,” says Stines. Floodwater mosquitoes lay their eggs in soil and those eggs hatch once the land is flooded.
Many of those sites are wooded areas and large spans of marshland that are so hard to reach that the mosquitoes are getting to live longer, up to six weeks old.
As a result, at a time when the mosquito equipment is normally being serviced in preparation for the next season, Mosquito Control Services is ramping up.
“We’ve brought down some extra ATVs to get into those woodland areas that are hard to access and we’ve done some aerial treatments to try to get those populations down as quick as possible,” says Stines.
