- April 19, 2024
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from: Mark Positano
Director, East Flagler Mosquito Control District
As part of the State Mutual Aid Agreement that the East Flagler Mosquito Control District participates in, the District was scheduled to render aid in the form of helicopter treatments of the salt marsh mosquito breeding sites in Volusia County on April 22-23.
Volusia Mosquito Control’s helicopter is not operational at this time, and, due to the pressing need to treat salt marsh mosquitoes before they emerge as biting adults, an emergency request was made for mosquito control assistance under the State Mutual Aid Agreement. For this joint operation, Volusia is supplying fuel and the pesticide, and the District will be reimbursed for equipment use and personnel expenses.
While it is important to be a good neighbor and lend assistance when possible, this effort also benefits the residents of the District. Volusia’s northern salt marsh mosquitoes become our problem because of the tremendous flight distance of salt marsh mosquitoes, migrating up to 20 miles.
There are 48 different species of mosquito that make their home in Flagler County. The salt marsh mosquitoes Aedes taeniorhynchus and Aedes sollicitans are among the worst of them, swarming residents and biting aggressively. These species can breed in vast numbers in the intermittently flooded areas of the nutrient rich and highly biologically productive salt marsh.
The District was formed in 1952 specifically to combat the salt marsh mosquitoes so that the area could be developed and made habitable year-round.
