What does the district do to fight West Nile Virus?

West Nile virus was established locally in 2004. We had no human cases or horse cases in 2008 but did detect virus presence in other sentinels.

Town spraying will start Thurday, July 2nd, 2009 from truck mounted, ultra low volume foggers starting at dusk. Spraying should last no longer than 2 1/2 hours. The District may also perform town spraying on Monday evenings if mosquito counts become elevated. The District now has full access to materials for agricultural use and anticipates normal operations for the rest of the season.

Beginning Tuesday, August 18th, 2009 the District will transtion from ground fogging over rice fields and other open agricultural areas to regular fogging in the orchard areas. As rice fields mature, and begin to be dried up the mosquitoes move to these secluded areas.

We expect to treat approximately 130,000 acres of rice with a target specific larvaecide. Additionally, we are expecting a good mosquitofish harvest and plan to make good use of them as mosquito larvae predators in area rice fields.

Additional summer employees will be hired to enhance the surveillance program. The District will use lab results from the dead bird surveillance program to establish local virus presence. Regularly submitted mosquito collections and sentinel chicken sera will also be used as a detection tool for West Nile Virus.

When enjoying outdoor activities, especially in the morning and evening hours, we are recommending that you apply a mosquito repellant.

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