MODESTO BEE
ORIGINAL ARTICLE

By CHRISTINA SALERNO
BEE STAFF WRITER

Last Updated: August 19, 2005, 04:29:42 AM PDT

When a member of the mosquito abatement team knocked on Emily Partida's door in northeast Modesto to ask if she would mind having a mosquito trap hung in her front yard, she readily agreed.
The trap, which lures mosquitoes into a net with lights and carbon dioxide to simulate human breath, is part of the stepped-up effort to combat the spread of West Nile virus.

On Thursday, which brought the announcement that three more Stanislaus County residents had become infected with the virus, three members of the East Side Mosquito Abatement District team spent the morning going door-to-door to about 30 homes to try and identify backyard breeding sources.

Standing water is the greatest breeding source for mosquitoes, especially in hot weather.

"Almost every house had a source, whether it was large or small," said Lloyd Douglass, manager of the East Side Mosquito Abatement District. "We found sources in a bathtub, birdbaths, buckets and a cement mixing tub."

Douglass said the team identified areas of concern for residents and suggested how to eliminate them.

The team covered neighborhoods near Carver Road, between Briggsmore and Standiford avenues. People have been cooperative, he said.

In the afternoon, Mosquito traps were placed in other neighborhoods to measure the number of mosquitoes before and after spraying, and to test the mosquitoes for West Nile.

Partida said she had no problem with a trap hanging on a branch of a tree in front of her house, near West Union and McHenry avenues.

"This is important," she said. "We've been struggling with mosquitoes for two months."

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