It has been another busy week. Last week we treated as much of the flood water along the coast as possible using utility vehicles. Normally we control salt marsh mosquitoes by using the helicopter over specifically mapped and monitored areas in the salt marsh where there are, for the most part, no people. This situation is different in that peoples yards have become the breeding areas. A major obstacle to effectively treating for larvae remains The Washington Oaks State Park as regulations prevent effective mosquito control treatments there. As a result, salt marsh mosquitoes have plagued that area. While we did aerial adulticide this morning along the coast with the helicopter Washington Oaks State Park and the hordes of mosquitoes within it were not treated. This adversely affects everyone in the area.
We have been treating all week with the fog trucks as flood water mosquitoes have once again surged ten days after the most recent flooding and a decline in population is shown after a record number of mosquitoes earlier in the week.
We were finding some larval development still in late stages as of yesterday so Sunday is the first day, with certainty, they will all be vulnerable to adulticiding once in the air. We will plan aerial missions along the West side of the District after that.