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County hunts mosquitos in your backyard | Print | E-mail Written by Chris J. Magyar Monday, 16 February 2009
The fight against mosquitos and West Nile Virus has taken to the skies. But what exactly can officials see?
If the satellite photos of your backyard arrive in time, there probably wont be a need for the Santa Cruz County Mosquito and Vector Control (MVC) District to fly overhead and snap photos this summer. In a world thoroughly photographed (and the airbrushed free of humans) by Google, people are starting to come to terms with the idea that privacy aint what it used to be, but a few Santa Cruz residents may be alarmed to find out that the county is peering over the hedges in search of mosquitos, and promise they wont look for anything else.
Were not looking for unpermitted buildings and things like that, says Paul Binding, the manager of the MVC. We cant tell if there are pot plants or whatever. At the height and resolution of these pictures, we can only distinguish a vehicle, but not what type it is. It gives us an idea of where there might be swimming pools or spas, but we cant tell a spa from a trampoline. We definitely cant see people. The typical photos are taken from 2,000 to 5,000 feet up. By comparison, Google Earth zooms in to 500 feet.
But if officials arent trying to peep on backyard showers or ferret out your stash, what are they looking for? Green pools, or untended bodies of water where Culex mosquitos, known to carry West Nile Virus, can breed. The best way to achieve that is contracting with helicopter photography companies to do aerial surveys, Binding says, though when county satellite surveying photos are current, they save a little money by using those instead. Weve been doing this for three or four years. We use an application to reference the aerial photograph, and then we can use assessors data to find out who the owner is and contact them and let them know their pool should be maintained, and in some cases we offer a mosquito-eating fish. If the property is vacant or neglected, we can get access and put mosquito-eating fish
in the pond or treat it. In this county, we only found 30 pools, but thats still 30 pools we wouldnt have found otherwise.
The aerial program is paid for by a $26,000 grant the MVC received from the state in August 2007, when the governor declared West Nile to be an emergency and freed up money for area mosquito control authorities. Prior to 2005, the MVC didnt monitor north county or the city areas at all, but voters approved expansion of the district in a mail-in ballot by a 70 percent margin, tacking on a small property tax to pay for the expansion to the entire county.
In addition to small pools in residential yards, the agency has managed to find other breeding sources that were hidden in plain sight, such as a quarter-acre stagnant pond near Harbor High School that had been a mysterious source of mosquitos during baseball season. While Santa Cruz has not yet had a human case of West Nile, the virus does appear in this county. This year, it has been found in three dead birds so far, though none of the sentinel chick flock has been touched, nor has the virus ever been detected in sample mosquitos the MVC sends off to labs for antibody tests.
West Nile is generally less of a threat for the cool coastal areas, Binding says. It was just a few years ago when the researchers were unsure about that, since mosquitos live longer in cool areas, but the disease doesnt amplify in the mosquitos as well as it does in warmer areas. That said, there are still plenty of compelling health reasons to keep the mosquito population in check. Even though the Monterey Bay is a cooler climate, some alarming diseases can potentially be spread here, including malaria.
County hunts mosquitos in your backyard | Print | E-mail Written by Chris J. Magyar Monday, 16 February 2009
The fight against mosquitos and West Nile Virus has taken to the skies. But what exactly can officials see?
If the satellite photos of your backyard arrive in time, there probably wont be a need for the Santa Cruz County Mosquito and Vector Control (MVC) District to fly overhead and snap photos this summer. In a world thoroughly photographed (and the airbrushed free of humans) by Google, people are starting to come to terms with the idea that privacy aint what it used to be, but a few Santa Cruz residents may be alarmed to find out that the county is peering over the hedges in search of mosquitos, and promise they wont look for anything else.
Were not looking for unpermitted buildings and things like that, says Paul Binding, the manager of the MVC. We cant tell if there are pot plants or whatever. At the height and resolution of these pictures, we can only distinguish a vehicle, but not what type it is. It gives us an idea of where there might be swimming pools or spas, but we cant tell a spa from a trampoline. We definitely cant see people. The typical photos are taken from 2,000 to 5,000 feet up. By comparison, Google Earth zooms in to 500 feet.
But if officials arent trying to peep on backyard showers or ferret out your stash, what are they looking for? Green pools, or untended bodies of water where Culex mosquitos, known to carry West Nile Virus, can breed. The best way to achieve that is contracting with helicopter photography companies to do aerial surveys, Binding says, though when county satellite surveying photos are current, they save a little money by using those instead. Weve been doing this for three or four years. We use an application to reference the aerial photograph, and then we can use assessors data to find out who the owner is and contact them and let them know their pool should be maintained, and in some cases we offer a mosquito-eating fish. If the property is vacant or neglected, we can get access and put mosquito-eating fish
in the pond or treat it. In this county, we only found 30 pools, but thats still 30 pools we wouldnt have found otherwise. The aerial program is paid for by a $26,000 grant the MVC received from the state in August 2007, when the governor declared West Nile to be an emergency and freed up money for area mosquito control authorities. Prior to 2005, the MVC didnt monitor north county or the city areas at all, but voters approved expansion of the district in a mail-in ballot by a 70 percent margin, tacking on a small property tax to pay for the expansion to the entire county.
In addition to small pools in residential yards, the agency has managed to find other breeding sources that were hidden in plain sight, such as a quarter-acre stagnant pond near Harbor High School that had been a mysterious source of mosquitos during baseball season. While Santa Cruz has not yet had a human case of West Nile, the virus does appear in this county. This year, it has been found in three dead birds so far, though none of the sentinel chick flock has been touched, nor has the virus ever been detected in sample mosquitos the MVC sends off to labs for antibody tests.
West Nile is generally less of a threat for the cool coastal areas, Binding says. It was just a few years ago when the researchers were unsure about that, since mosquitos live longer in cool areas, but the disease doesnt amplify in the mosquitos as well as it does in warmer areas. That said, there are still plenty of compelling health reasons to keep the mosquito population in check. Even though the Monterey Bay is a cooler climate, some alarming diseases can potentially be spread here, including malaria.
