Comment by schiffern
8 days ago
After checking the obvious like old tires or stagnant ditches or tire tracks, the more hidden breeding sites include house gutters, French drains (under the gravel), buried yard drains, and garage floor drains.
The general rule is that mosquitos need a pool of water the size of a bottle cap, and it needs to be there for at least a week. Good luck, and good hunting.
I didn’t even think of my rain gutters. I haven’t cleaned them this year. Thanks
My neighbor's shed gutters are completely blocked. That definitely means that there's a limit on what I can do to help mitigate the issue.
you toss a dunk on their roof.
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Water suitable for mosquito breeding in nature is probably three million times more common than the man-made.
Keep in mind the range of a tiny flying insect. I just took a walk and found 6 places where I could see the wrigglers going. I put dunks in them all. Probably killed about a thousand. Hopefully getting one back for the team.
It's possible that your completely invented number is true if you average over the entire Earth, but I don't care about mosquitos in some deep mountainous Montana wilderness. I care about the subset of mosquitos near my house.
Just to be clear, my recommendation is to mitigate both man-made and natural breeding sites. Fortunately mosquito dunks don't harm other species.
> I care about the subset of mosquitos near my house.
So do I, but mosquitos are usually a problem for people who live close to nature. And then you'll have lakes, puddles, ditches, swamps, etc. But maybe I'm wrong and mosquitos don't fly that far, as another commenter here mentioned.
I will certainly try the mosquito dunks as you advise. Hope they can help.
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beware the undulated lids of garbage bins standing outside your house ... or an uncapped recycling bin