Communities replace fog truck 

 with new insect-fighting equipment 



"Hey mister, a truck carrying a strange-looking machine just went 

 by my house. Sign on the side said 'mosquito control,' but no fog 

 was coming out the back. When's the fog truck coming? Mosquitoes 

 are awful out here." 



Seen any strange-looking machines on trucks marked "mosquito 

 control" roaming the streets of your neighborhood? 



You may well have. Many community mosquito and biting fly 

 controllers in eastern North Carolina are switching from the old 

 fogging method to something new called ultra low volume, or ULV 

 for short. It could be that any strange-looking machines you've seen 

 are part of the new ULV insect control technique. 



ULV equipment puts out a fine mist that kills mosquitoes just as 

 well as the dense fog, said Dr. R. C. Axtell, NCSU entomologist. 

 What's more, ULV is cheaper, safer and easier to work with, he 

 added. 



No more peering through insecticide pea soup with ULV either. 

 The fine mist from ULV machines has little or no effect on seeing 

 where you're going and what's coming at you, explained Axtell. So 

 there's much less chance of traffic accidents than with the old fogging 

 method. 



A mixture of fuel oil and insecticide creates that dense white 

 'smoke' in the fogging method. ULV uses no fuel oil except for 

 gasoline needed to run the truck. With today's high petroleum prices 

 that can mean real savings to the community, scientists say. 



Drs. Axtell and J. C. Dukes, in charge of research and advisory 

 services in mosquito and biting fly control sponsored by UNC Sea 

 Grant and the N. C. Agricultural Experiment Station, have been 

 telling county, municipal and private pest control workers about 

 ULV — and other techniques that can better control large insect out- 

 breaks — in two-day training sessions. 



Sessions were held in Morehead City and Wilmington last month. 

 Another will be offered in Manteo in April. 



In these sessions, Axtell stresses that insect pest monitoring — or 

 gathering data on precise times and conditions in which mosquitoes 

 and biting flies are most abundant — is essential. 



Monitoring can save money by enabling insect pest control opera- 

 tors to treat only when insects are most severe and in areas where 

 they strike hardest. 



In the past, insecticides have often been applied on a regular calen- 

 dar basis or as a result of phone calls from irate citizens regardless 

 of whether the insects posed a severe nuisance or not. This can 

 become costly and wasteful. 



— Gayle Morton 



Sea Grant depository publications 



The National Sea Grant De- 

 pository at the University of 

 Rhode Island's Pell Marine Sci- 

 ence Library has published in- 

 dexes of Sea Grant newsletters 



for 1973 and publications for 

 1973 and the first half of 1974. 

 These indexes are available for 

 loan from the UNC Sea Grant 

 Program office. 



The University of North Carolina Sea Grant Program Newsletter is published 

 monthly by the University of North Carolina Sea Grant Program, 1235 Burlington 

 Laboratories, Yarborough Drive, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, 

 N. C. 27607. Vol. 2. No. 4. April, 1975. Dr. B. J. Copeland, director. Dixie Berg, 

 editor. Second-class postage paid at Raleigh, N. C. 27611 



A sacrifice 

 for 



research 



"One, two, three, four 

 ouch!" 



No, those aren't the 

 sounds of a karate begin- 

 ner. They're the moan- 

 ings of graduate students 

 helping out on Dr. R. C. 

 Axtell's research. 



Axtell, N. C. State Uni- 

 versity entomologist, is 

 trying to learn more 

 about pesky mosquitoes 

 and biting flies that can 

 wreak havoc on a beach 

 vacation. His goal is to 

 come up with methods 

 that local governments 

 can use to control the in- 

 sects for minimum cost 

 and environmental dam- 

 age. 



Before Axtell and his 

 co-workers can come up 

 with the best ways to con- 

 trol those bothersome 

 bugs, he's got to know 

 when and where they 

 strike hardest. To get 

 that information, he's got 

 to use good bait. 



That's where graduate 

 students come in. It's all 

 part of getting an educa- 

 tion — they tell them- 

 selves — standing there 

 in one spot, shirt off, 

 counting the number of 

 mosquitoes, sandflies, 

 horseflies and deerflies 

 that land every minute. 

 And because it's for the 

 sake of research, they're 

 able to do precious little 

 to stop the painful nib- 

 bling. 



It's not much fun, but 

 it's the best way Axtell's 

 found to get the the in- 

 formation he needs. He 

 also uses rabbits and 

 chickens and special light 

 traps. But to solve a prob- 

 lem bothering humans, 

 there's no substitute for 

 the real thing. 



— Gayle Morton 



