An Article from the Quarterly Fall 1995 Edition

(Fall 1995) A Note about Mosquitoes

Many of you will have noticed the large influx of mosquitoes this summer. Some of you will have noticed that these were not our regular pests of dusk dinner parties on the porch, but rather, they were nasty, day-time bloodsuckers which attacked you in the garden, on the beach, or hung around until they could attack you in your own bed.

According to our Mosquito Expert, these dipteran devils were Aedes dorsalis, the salt-marsh mosquito. Although larvae numbers had been low previous to July 22, several factors combined to make the rest of July and most of August very miserable for those outdoors. We had rain for the first time in a long while that weekend, and we had three high tides over ten feet And unfortunately, that weekend, the gate in the culvert under Pilkey Point Road which regulates water flow to the salt-marsh was broken. (It has since been repaired.) This gave us the "mosquito boom" of epic proportions.

The prevailing winds blowing those few days managed to lift the newly hatched flies to most parts of the Island. It was also noted by several people that we did not have as many swallows this year as in others, and they usually do an admirable job of keeping mosquito numbers down. By August, however, we did have a large number of very fat dragon flies patrolling the open spaces, doing their bit to keep us from involuntary blood donations.

Jeannine Caldbeck