Mosquito Management Services is busy in the lab even when conditions aren't ripe for mosquito breeding
When it's cold outside, things are heating up in the Hillsborough County Mosquito Management Services laboratory.
What are the mosquito experts doing? They're looking through microscopes and cataloging mosquito eggs in the lab, and researching the most efficient and cost-effective ways to keep Hillsborough residents safe during the hot, rainy months ahead.
Raising local mosquitoes
Hillsborough's Mosquito Management Services team raises mosquitoes year-round in its laboratory near Interstate 4 and U.S. 301 outside Tampa. They collect mosquito eggs in parks, cemeteries, salt marshes, neighborhoods, office parks, and from other locations during the height of summer, when eggs can be found everywhere. Then they catalog the eggs and keep them safe in the lab until it is time to run experiments.
These are not just any mosquitoes. Lab mosquitoes are carefully chosen from every corner of Hillsborough County to be tested so the team will have the data they need to be as efficient as possible in each community.
Turns out, the Aedes aegypti (a disease-carrying species often called the Yellow Fever mosquito) found in a backyard dog bowl in Ruskin might have a different tolerance for treatment than the same species in an abandoned tire in Town 'N Country. Likewise, the Culex quinquefasciatus (a southern house mosquito known to carry West Nile Virus) found in Valrico might have a higher tolerance than the same species in South Tampa, and so on.
The Hillsborough County team actively monitors and tests which insecticide products are effective on multiple species found across the county to determine which product is most efficient in each community.
The Aedes mosquito eggs are captured on germination papers suspended in baited collection cups throughout the county. Fertilized mosquito eggs can stay viable for months to years in dry conditions. These egg "rafts" are collected in containers where the pregnant, blood-fed females are looking for the perfect place to raise babies.
The environmental science team then labels all the samples, cataloging both the species and location where the eggs were collected, to conduct future experiments.
Time to test the treatment
Hillsborough's mosquito team uses integrated mosquito management with the lowest amount of treatment possible each time the crew treats adult and larval mosquitoes. If they use too much, they run the risk of developing resistance among the mosquitoes and possibly even affecting other organisms.
The team is dedicated to being faithful stewards of the ecosystem, and they work tirelessly to keep the community safe while allowing natural, biological systems to flourish.
Employees test mosquitoes for their tolerance of various products both in the lab - using test tubes and wearing lab coats - and in the field with special mosquito cages and product sprayers.
By testing both adult and larvae in the laboratory, susceptibility and resistance can be documented to establish baseline data. In conjunction with these experiments, the team also tests the products and equipment (both ground and aerial applications) in the field to make sure they're operating correctly and efficiently.
Field cage trials are utilized to evaluate two variables - mortality over time at different distances, and droplet sizes captured at those distances - to generate significant results for the scientists recording the experiments. For example, mosquitoes collected from Westchase may die with limited treatment strength at a long distance, but the same species from Wimauma might only die when it gets a more potent treatment at a closer distance.
Using the data to keep residents safe
This gives the team instrumental data to incorporate into management and operations when the mosquito hatch-offs begin after the first summer rains.
The quantified data collected in the field provides Hillsborough mosquito inspectors with vital information about which product is most effective for specific mosquito species found in diverse habitats throughout Hillsborough County, which allows the team to practice the best scientific methodology for successfully managing multiple mosquito species populations.