Annette Hayden Havre Daily News ahayden@havredailynews.com
Hill County has tested positive for West Nile and authorities are urging the public to take precautions. “We have been clean all the way up to last week,” Hill County Weed and Mosquito District Coordinator Terry Turner said this morning. “The sample we collected from our trap Monday, Aug. 6, tested positive six out of ten. We want to warn the public to protect themselves.” Turner said the district’s mosquito trap is located near the Buffalo Jump behind Holiday Village Shopping Center. Every Monday, samples from the trap are collected and shipped to a lab at Montana State University in Bozeman. Turner’s office received lab results on Aug. 13. “We received e-mail notification that six out of 10 culex, the type of mosquito that carries West Nile, tested positive for the virus,” Turner said. “There are 54 different kinds of mosquitoes in Montana, the culex is the only type that carries West Nile. The ones that bite you during the daytime are not the culex and not carrying the virus. The culex come up a little before dusk and sunrise. That is why we are fogging from about 7:30 to 11 p.m., when the culex is most active.” Turner said during early morning and in the evening people need to make sure they are wearing long sleeves and using Deet products to protect themselves. “It’s real scary listening to what some have experienced with West Nile,” he said. “Some people it effects mildly, kind of like the flu. Several in Havre have gotten severe symptoms in the past. The thing about i t , West Ni l e attacks everybody. One young man I know was 26 and in per fect ly good physi cal condition he got sick for a month in August of 2003. He recently wrote me a letter describing what it was like, and basically he wished he was dead it was so bad.” Turner said Harlem has been testing positive for West Nile for about three weeks ac c o rding to the lab i n Bozeman. He said Blaine County has their own testing machine and has also been positive for about three weeks. “People need to know that we cannot spray for the mosquitoes in winds over 5 miles per hour,” Turner said. “Aug. 3 was the last time we could spray until a couple of nights ago, because it’s a fog of real small particles and has to drift up into the air. In windy conditions it’s not effect. Conditions varied two nights ago, the wind was going u p and d own, b u t the mosquitoes were so thick we had to go for it. We have gotten two nights of spraying in this week.” On a v e r a g e Tu r n e r ’ s department is able to spray for mosquitoes one out of every four nights, he said. The public i s strongly e n c o u ra ge d t o ke e p a l l standing water out of yards and fields, dispose of old tires and any other items that can hold water. “I’d like to remind everyone that just one cup of water can produce 250 mosquitoes,” Tu r n e r s a i d. “ I n t h e temperatures we have been having they can hatch out in five days in one cup of water. You get a five-gallon bucket half-full with water and that’s 10,000 mosquitoes. “Like the health officials say, West Nile is here to stay,” he added. “We can spray and work to keep the populations down, but the public has to do everything they can to protect themselves.”
