You Say Tomato I Say Mosquito
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Article by: Jim Burnell Gathering tomatoes , Adding a Water Feature to Your Yard or other fruits , Wooden You Like to Know? A Primer to Wood Outdoor Furnishings of the garden , Decks For Above Ground Pools: Can Beautify Your Yard As Well might not sound like a dangerous occupation, but with terrorism running rampant these days, even a walk thru the garden , The Design Principle of Unity in ing and Landscaping can require pre-emptive measures. In fact if you left the screen door , Tick Bites open for a minute or so and heard a whiny frequency accompanied by a slight tickle it may already be too late, if that slight tickle was the allergic reaction of your skin cells to the Culex, Aedes or Anopheles mosquito, one of the several species that prefer humans, and are capable of transmitting microbial organisms to living cells. Every year two million people die of malaria, which is transmitted by the Anopheles mosquito, but most of those deaths occur in Africa. In the U.S. malaria is considered rare, but the West Nile Virus is on the move. The West Nile Virus is two millionths of an inch wide, smaller than most viruses. Viruses occupy a special taxonomy position in that they are not plant, , Make a Plan for Vacation Watering animal or prokaryotic bacteria, and should not even be considered organisms because they are not free-living. (They cannot reproduce with out a host cell.) The West Nile Virus has been studied for decades but did not arrive in the US until 1999. It is most similarly assocciated with other viruses that cause encephalitis, (inflammation of the brain), and it is highly fatal to avian species, corvids, mostly non-migratory birds , Gardening For s distinguished by same sex characteristics. The West Nile Virus is also fatal to horses although there is a two-dose vaccine available for horses. It is not known when a vaccine will be discovered for humans or birds, , Vegetable Gardening so the best method of dealing with the virus is through avoidance. The West Nile Virus is past on to its animal host through the saliva of the female mosquito at the time of injection. The female mosquito needs a blood meal to complete reproduction, and pass on proteins to her offspring. The male mosquito does not eat blood but lives only on nectar and fruit , Myths About Lawns juices. Avoiding mosquitoes can be a big problem if you're an outdoors , Brilliant Corners: House Plants and Your Health person unless your companion is more susceptible to mosquito bites than you are. Some people attract more mosquitoes than others. (They must have a better bloodline.) Mosquitoes can lay their eggs in as little as one tablespoon of water , Gardening For Birds which hatch and become adults in as little as seven to ten days. Finding all the water , Japanese Gardens Basic Design Questions That Should Be Addressed sources in which they can breed is next to impossible, but eliminating the obvious places , Hibiscus Tea will help. (Rain gutters, bird , Adding a Water Feature to Your Yard baths, flower , Lawn Furniture pots etc.) In order to avoid mosquitoes it helps to know how they find you. They use sensors on their antenna to pick up body heat, , How to Make a Simple Homemade Aeroponics System odor and carbon-dioxide from exhaled breath to find their meal. That's why black-light traps do not really work well, (mosquitoes use thermal imaging, not ultra violet). The female mosquito will work her way upwind zigzagging back and forth to the sources of these bodily cues. As she gets closer she uses colors , A Teak Table - Accent Your Outdoor Decor With One and moisture , Outdoor Kitchens: Attention All Cooks - You've Never Had It This Good! in the air , Tick Bites to close in on her target. British researchers found that mosquitoes would respond to animal bodies up to forty-five feet away. Mosquitoes become inactive when temperatures , A Teak Table - Accent Your Outdoor Decor With One drop below forty-five degrees F or above eighty-two degrees F or when wind speeds are higher than six meters per second. Some repellents are very effective at binding the mosquito sensory antenna. Repellants composed of heavy irregular shaped molecules work best. They block the pores of the sensory hairs of the mosquito antenna forcefully changing the mosquitoes point of view, causing her to fly past a living target. Area repellants like candles and incense with citronella have been proven effective at averting mosquitoes and even a plain wax candle can work as a decoy to trick mosquitoes. One of the best and most familiar repellents is a chemical product , Hydroponics Lighting: Blue Spectrum V.S. Red-Orange Spectrum called Deet, which was developed by the USDA and patented by the US Army in 1946 and then registered in 57 for use by the general public. It is a broad spectrum repellent targeting many different insect pests, , What Type of Gazebo is Right for You? Top Questions You Need to Ask however one thing that might not be so well known is that Deet should not be used in conjunction with any other insecticide containing Permethrin as it can cause severe cellular damage according to Duke Universities Journal of Toxicology and Environmental , Make a Plan for Vacation Watering Health. One of the most interesting, and recent repellants I have discovered while researching this article is the use of a common perennial herb , Myths About Lawns or weed , Growing in My Garden called catnip. Researchers at Iowa State University and the US Forest Service released information , Adding a Water Feature to Your Yard in 2001 on the effectiveness of nepetalactone, an essential oil found in catnip that works 10 times more efficiently than Deet although they say nothing about its duration comparison. Iowa State had submitted a patent application for the use of catnip compounds for insect repellents and commercial products , Decks For Above Ground Pools: Can Beautify Your Yard As Well are already available to the general public, (although I do not know if that means that thorough testing on humans or animals were completed). Caveat Emptor. Obviously cats will be meowing all over the neighborhood once these products , Outdoor Kitchens: Attention All Cooks - You've Never Had It This Good! become popular. (Skeeter-free, Natures , Wooden You Like to Know? A Primer to Wood Outdoor Furnishings Herbal, Natural , Creating A Balcony Garden Oasis Herbal Shield are a few). Some companies may be cheating the law by not calling there products , Gardening For Birds a "Repellant", so as to bypass FDA regulations. , General Lawn Maintenance Tips You may want to try mixing your own concoction of catnip repellant. It's available at nurseries and in the wild if you know what it looks like. Catnip was introduced to the US from Europe in the late 18th Century, and has been used for seasoning and teas for years. It is thought to have many healing properties , Floral Garden and Landscape Toupees among them help for (inducing sleep, migraine headaches, fevers, sedative, fatigue, restlessness, pain killers, improving circulation and symptoms associated with the flu.) It is also high in vitamin C. Catnip was also called the "Hang-mans Root" and was used by early American colonial executioners to put them in the mood before an execution. In England it was used to flavor beer because it cost less than hops. Over the years their have been many other plant-derived repellants to combat insects such as lavender extract, cedar wood, , Ideas For Your Front Yard Landscaping Project neem oil, Rosemary, peppermint geranium, lemongrass and others. As far as electronic devises sold to repel insects, be sure the experts who tested these devices were not on the companies payroll, or be careful of which expert you listen to. Some of these products , Brilliant Corners: House Plants and Your Health do more damage than good. In May 2001 the FTC sent warning letters to 60 companies selling these devises, warning them not to make claims without scientific evidence. In August 2002, Lentek International was charged by the FTC, for making false claims that their electronic mosquito repelling devices, repel mosquitoes. (WWW .ft c.gov/opa/2002/08/lentek.htm) One proven method that partially worked for my dad when I was growing , Benefit from the Expertise of a Landscaping Contractor up, was the nightly mosquito hunt. Each night before bedtime the five of us kids were assigned a rolled up newspaper and a room, , Tips For a Long Lasting Amaryllis and we could not go to bed , Tick Bites until every mosquito in the house , Vinyl Fencing Is A Viable Alternative To Wood was extinguished. It worked 90% of the time and gave the walls , Do You Want to Have Concrete Balls? and ceilings that natured texture look. The funny thing bout it was the other 10% of the time the mosquitoes only got dad. Mosquitoes play an important role in the food , How to Make a Weed Dabber chain, mostly in their larvae and pupae stages, transforming algae, bacteria and organic , Outdoor Kitchens: Attention All Cooks - You've Never Had It This Good! matter into meals for fish , General Lawn Maintenance Tips and other aquatic creatures and wading birds , How To Keep s Off Of Your Patio Furniture etc. and it would not be beneficial to eliminate all of them. Last year out of 830 reported human infections, 27 were fatal. In November 2003 a bio Technology Company called Acambis started the first human clinical trial of a West Nile Virus vaccine. So far it has performed well in hamster, mice, monkeys and horses. Most cases of the disease , Patio Design and Patio Furniture - The Use of Focal Points occurs in the elderly and others with impaired immune systems, there have been cases of transmission through blood transfusions, and organ transplants. In most cases those who have West Nile Virus do not even know they have it. A few will develop flu like symptoms 4 to 10 days after the infection, and a rare few will develop encephalitis. Copyright Jim Burnell 2005 Sources: University of Ca. Publication 7451 Author: Bruce Eldridge, Dept. of Entomology, and UC Davis Catnip as a Mosquito Repellent Author: Jeffrey s. Hoard National Association for Holistic Aromatherapy Dept of Health and Human Services Center for Disease , Wooden You Like to Know? A Primer to Wood Outdoor Furnishings Control and Prevention Grow your own mosquito repellant Author: Ann Lovejoy Integrated Pest , Outdoor Storage Sheds Management of Alaska Iowa State University Extension Fact Sheet Mosquito Iowa State University Joel Coats, Entomology Brian Meyer, Agriculture , Benefit from the Expertise of a Landscaping Contractor CommunicationsJim Burnell is a carpenter/cabinet maker and small business owner with a lifetime of varied hobbies from boat building , Homemade Hydroponics System Plan to studying Zeno's paradox. Currently he is studying the effects of catnip on mosquitoes and other insects, the testing and raising of certain beneficial insects in the garden , How to Prune Lilac Shrubs and in captivity, and simplifying certain gardening , Tick Bites procedures in transplanting and cloning. For links to his other articles, journals and ideas he can be reached at his website: http://www.spreadtheworld.blogspot.com |
  
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