Mosquito season opens; Officials ask for public's help in preventing pests from breeding

Residents of Bakersfield and the southern San Joaquin Valley scored a lucky break this mosquito season when almost weekly cold weather fronts arrived in April and early May to tamp down mosquito populations and delay the inevitable.

But with daily temperatures rising into the 80s and 90s for the forecast-able future, mosquito season has finally arrived.

"After all the spring rains we've had, it's really important to inspect your yards, and do your part to get rid of all the standing water sources right now, because Aedes aegypti mosquitoes, they're showing up in our traps. They're just starting to wake up," said Terry Knight, spokesman for Kern Mosquito and Vector Control District.

Knight was joined at a news conference and open house Thursday morning at Kern Mosquito headquarters on Allen Road by officials from the Kern County Department of Public Health and representatives from two other area mosquito control districts, one in Delano and one based in Taft.

Public health spokeswoman Michelle Corson talked about mosquito-borne diseases such as West Nile virus, and St. Louis encephalitis virus, as well as ways local residents can protect themselves and their families.

"West Nile virus is the main disease spread by mosquitoes in the United States, and that of course includes California and Kern County," Corson said. "West Nile virus is spread mostly by the bite of an infected mosquito. It is not transmissible from person to person."

About four out of five, or 80%, of people infected by the virus are not going to experience any symptoms, she said.

"But there is this 20 percent who can become ill, and there is a small percentage (who) can become ill and even die," Corson said.

Common symptoms include fever, headache, rash, muscle weakness, nausea and vomiting.

"Severe illness would result in something like encephalitis and meningitis," she said. "Again, this is extremely rare, but we just want our public to be familiar with these."

St. Louis encephalitis presents similar symptoms, Corson said, but it is rarely talked about because it is even more rare than West Nile.

Knight focused on the Aedes aegypti, nicknamed the ankle-biter mosquito because it tends to bite its victims below the knees or on the outside of the elbow and often bites multiple times.

This mosquito "is strictly a residential mosquito," he said.

It breeds in containers, such as yard drains, buckets, tires, flooded sprinkler valve boxes and the saucers below potted plants.

"This mosquito, if there's any one good thing about it, it doesn't fly very far," Knight said. "Its home range is only about 150 yards, so it's not going to go very far from where it hatched."

Aedes aegypti is not capable of spreading West Nile or St. Louis encephalitis. Those illnesses are spread by the more common Culex mosquitoes, which are larger than the Aedes variety, and breed in large water sources, such as green swimming pools.

Kern Mosquito and Vector Control District discovered 2,100 green or unmaintained swimming pools during a recent aerial survey of the district, which includes Arvin, Lamont, Bakersfield, Shafter, Wasco and Buttonwillow. Green pools attract breeding and disease-carrying mosquitoes.

Residents need to do better this year, Knight said. Otherwise, it's impossible for the district to effectively combat this worsening pest.

"Let's make this year better than last year," he said, "and better than the year before."