When most of our snowbirds start packing up and prepare for their northern trek, most of us who stay behind fully understand it’s humidity and heat. But then there's always that pesky little beast that tries to run all of us out.

When I was a pre-teen being dragged around Colorado beaver dams in search of that wondrous rainbow trout by my fishing fanatic father, I learned first hand, mosquitos were everywhere. I know better than to think mosquitos run our snowbirds out.

This year we got the category 5 of perfect mosquito conditions. We had little humidity but a fairly warmer than normal winter. The big thing was the drought. Somehow those nasty little blood sucking monsters just hunker their eggs down and wait. The wait is for the inevitable 2”+ rain that frees them up into the dreaded “wigglers”. Three to five days after the wigglers have had their aquatic fun it’s off to find suckers they can bleed, us.

This week has been the mosquito awakening, it’s been brutal. So far many have filed requests to Martin County for the mosquito control spraying. The truck buzzed around Sugarhill Monday night (4/24) and as of Wednesday afternoon the Mosquitos are worse than Monday. Monday was 15-17mph wind from the east so probably there are no mosquitos in the Savannas Park, if you get the drift.

The mosquito truck returned Wed night 4/26. Weather Wednesday night had less wind, hopefully it will work. If you want to file a report for “adult mosquitos” with Martin County go to Martin County Mosquito Control Request. This seems to be the best way to get things moving.

Now Sugarhill has one issue that may make this mosquito problem worse than the majority of Florida neighborhoods. We have bubblers, that’s right I said bubblers. The big metal grates you see throughout the community were part of the 1979 drainage plan to protect our roads. They don’t remove water as you would expect but rather they keep water from flowing across our roads. This is done by taking water from one side of the road running it under the road in a pipe then allowing it to bubble up and out of the grate on the other side, a lower side.

Many people living in or doing work in Sugarhill aren’t aware that these “drainage grates” are not connected to a municipal storm drain system. The problem with the bubblers is they tend to hold water and standing water breeds mosquitos. If you are a mosquito magnet like I am you will notice the elevated mosquito attacks when you are near one of Sugarhill’s 16 bubblers.
After this year's infestation we believe Sugarhill should slow or stop these bubblers from being the breeding menace they currently are. This can be done by the application of the most commonly used mosquitocide Bti. If you have ever heard of the product “dunks” that are shaped like little donuts, they are made from Bti.

Bti (Bacillus thuringiensis israelensis) is a naturally occurring bacteria that is commonly used for mosquito control. It is considered safe for humans, pets, and the environment because it only targets mosquito larvae and does not harm other organisms. Because Bti is effective in controlling mosquito populations it reduces the risk of mosquito-borne diseases such as West Nile virus, Dengue virus and Zika virus, all diseases that have shown up in our semi-tropical area.

There are neighborhood volunteers willing to properly apply the Bti granules to our bubblers as needed. Granules sprinkled into each bubbler would be a very small amount, less than a tea spoon. We think this is the safest control of the bubbler breeding boxes. Liquid Bti is what Martin County sprays when the mosquito truck buzzes around Sugarhill. We believe there isn’t enough spray getting into the bubblers to be effective.