Crookston Public Works Director Chuck Getsman recently attended a training session on mosquito control in the local area put on by Grand Forks Mosquito Control, a division of Grand Forks Public Health.
“They have their lab where they can see if any of the mosquitoes they catch have West Nile or are carrying any specific diseases. It’s really neat, but yeah, I went there. I did roughly four hours of training,” said Getsman. “I met with Eric Nelson and Laura, and they walked me through the process of identifying certain types of mosquitoes, which ones we are supposed to count, and which ones we don’t need to count. If we get certain mosquitoes in the trap, these are the West Nile-carrying mosquitoes, we can turn those into the Grand Forks Mosquito Control, and they can analyze them for us to tell us if any of them do, in fact, have West Nile. They gave us wonderful tips from tips that will save the city some money to get a more accurate count on mosquitoes when we should or shouldn’t be spraying, and what chemicals work best on the mosquitoes around here.”
Getsman plans to share his knowledge with fellow public works employees via a two-hour training session. He feels this new information will help the City of Crookston employees more efficiently deal with the city’s mosquito problems. “With all the rain we’ve been getting lately, mosquitoes love water. They’re going to feed when they can, lay eggs where they can, and when the heat jumps up, that’s when they hatch.” Said Getsman. “So, with the weather being the way it is this week, we could see a lot of mosquitoes hatching and big blooms of mosquitoes going out here and there. So, we are going to keep an eye on the trap and keep an eye on the mosquito count and attack as necessary.”
