Elsa leaves behind breeding ground for mosquitoes in SWFL

LEE COUNTY, Fla. – Although Elsa may be gone, the storm has left a breeding ground for blood sucking mosquitoes.

The potential for the population to dramatically increase has mosquito control preparing for battle, and they’re enlisting the help of Mother Nature to rid Southwest Florida of the pesky insect.

They’re using mosquito fish whose main delicacy is mosquito larva.  

Eric Johnson heads the Lee County Mosquito Control and said property owners with pooling water that may contain the larva can request the fish which look like minnows to join the list of natural predators that help control mosquitoes.

Old tires and buckets containing water can also become a breeding ground for mosquitoes, but mosquito control has been out this week conducting aerial views looking for ponding water that may contain larva.

“There are definitely pockets where there are more mosquitoes than we would like to see out there,” Johnson said.

Peggy Captina lives in North Fort Myers and described the mosquito outbreak there as severe.

The problem could be made worse by standing water.

“It’s actually pretty bad, you have all this standing water from the hurricane, and you can’t even be out here without being bit up,” said Sean Kukuruga.

Gustavo Trevino said he is spending less time outdoors because of the mosquito problem he’s seeing in Cape Coral that was hit hard by heavy rains which left ponding in his neighborhood.

“They’re everywhere. Last night I put on bug spray and it didn’t even work,” Trevino said.

That leaves the job to rid them up to mosquito control.

“Likely tomorrow we’ll be out doing full treatments on mosquito larvae throughout the county, especially some of the island areas and some areas inland,” Johnson stated.

If you live in Lee County and have an area that you think could use some mosquito fish, you can always call Lee County Mosquito Control at 239-694-2174 to help fight the bite.

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