Winter weather continues to keep mosquito activity to a minimum. Consequently, adult mosquito populations were not high enough to require ULV truck or airplane treatments during January. Total rainfall during January (3.23 in) was near the ten-year historical average (4.09 in) for the month. Average January temperature (51֯ F) was also near the ten-year historical average (50.5 ֯F).
District personnel that are involved with aerial mosquito control operations attended the annual Florida Mosquito Control Fly-in to learn about new techniques and procedures for safe and efficacious operations. We also combined this trip with a site visit at Collier County Mosquito Control to learn about their use of helicopters to perform aerial larviciding operations. Throughout this year in conjunction with a local contract helicopter service we will be evaluating the effectiveness of aerial larviciding with rotary-wing aircraft.
The agency’s 2018 annual report was recently published Though the report details the accomplishments by department, I’d like to highlight a few of the major successes of our agency:
- The concerted integration of our laboratory team and our field operations team to incorporate the temperature-dependent time for an immature mosquito to develop into larvicide treatment practices.
- The replacement of the facilities outdoor and indoor lights with LEDs resulted in immediate electricity savings and reduced maintenance costs.
- A renewed emphasis on safety and training by initiating weekly supervisor’s meetings and monthly agency-wide meetings.
- The agency’s first public bid process for financial services (banking) has resulted in the bid awarding to a local institution and a variable interest rate that is at least 0.6% higher than the former institution (at least ~$60,000 annually).
If you’d like a digital copy of this report, please send me an email caillouet@stpmad.org.
Sincerely,
Kevin A. Caillouet, Ph.D., M.S.P.H.
Director