Week 6

Mosquito ID

I'm continuing to practice my ID skills. They've improved a lot over the past two weeks! I can confidently identify a perturbans now, after counting about 5,000 of them! We are mostly catching perturbans in our CDCs and Culex in our gravid traps. We are also finding japonicus and other Aedes. I will continue to practice using the ID guide and learning what mosquitoes commonly found in this area look like.

Connecting ID to Trapping

I've started to find connections between the trap site and the mosquito samples collected. Perturbans are commonly found in swampy areas, and I've noticed that my trap sites in really swampy towns collect a lot of perturbans, especially if my CDC is hanging close to a marsh. These swampy towns are also probably most likely to be exposed to EEE as a result.

Marsh site in Sturbridge.

Public Education

When I'm out trapping, people walking by will sometimes ask me about what I'm doing. I really enjoy this part of the job because I get to share everything I've learned with them. I like explaining how the traps work and why we are setting them up. I've had a few people come up and thank me for the work that I'm doing, which was really nice and motivating me to do this work. While we haven't found any diseased mosquitoes yet, I still think that public outreach and awareness is vital. It's important that the public is aware of the risk and knows what they can do to prevent disease transmission and also what CMMCP can do to help them.

Comments

Weeks 1 and 2

My day to save for the summer: CDC Traps For the past two weeks, my main job has been setting up and taking down CDC traps. These traps look a little bit like miniature flying saucers, but instead of aliens coming down from them, mosquitoes are going into them! CMMCP mainly uses CO2 CDC traps, which release carbon dioxide from a tank we connect to the top of the trap. Mosquito antennae detect carbon dioxide, and this ability is used by the mosquitos to find sources of blood, so they are attracted to the CO2 emitted by our traps. Some CDC traps use light to attract the mosquitos, but we use the CO2 traps to reduce the number of junk bugs (the bugs that get caught in the trap that aren't mosquitos). Once a mosquito flies close to the trap, a fan pushes them down into a collection cup where they cannot escape. The next day, I return to the trap to collect the sample and disassemble the trap. My truck, packed and ready to set up CDC CO2 traps. CDC CO2 trap Once I ge...

Week 9

West Nile Virus Positives This week, we had three West Nile Virus positive pools this week: in Blackstone, Natick, and Worcester. Blackstone and Natick are in my route, so I trapped the positive mosquitoes in those towns. It's a little scary knowing I was so close to mosquitoes with WNV. This positive case has also brought new meaning to my job as a trapper. I'm glad I was part of the team that caught these WNV cases and were able to help out the public. I think these positives will peak public curiosity and worry about mosquitoes, so I think I will have a lot more people come up and ask my questions. So, I'll make sure to brush up on my knowledge of WNV so that I can educate them and hopefully minimize their risk of contracting a vector-borne disease. Golden Anopheles Last week we found many mosquitoes uncommon to central Massachusetts in our traps. On Thursday, Audrey and I were processing mosquitoes when she noticed a very large, golden bug in her trap. We didn't k...

Weeks 7 and 8

Continuing to Trap and ID Over the past two weeks, I've continued to go out in the field and collect mosquitoes using CDC CO2 traps and gravid traps. No mosquitoes in our towns have tested positive for any diseases yet, which is good! But, Norfolk County had its first case of West Nile and Plymouth County had its first case of EEE last week, so we expect a positive soon. The number of perturbans we caught has decreased dramatically compared to the last couple weeks. As the CDC traps become less full, the gravid traps are getting fuller. I'm getting more familiar with distinguishing Culex mosquitoes and will continue to practice this over the rest of the internship. First of the Trainee Summer Seminar Series! Dr. Beard: Future Vector-Borne Disease Workforce On Friday, I attended Dr. Ben Beard's insightful presentation on the future trajectory of vector-borne diseases (VBDs). Dr. Beard emphasized the profound impact of climate change on VBDs, highlighting how shifts in clim...

Aoife's NEVBD Internship Blog

Search This Blog