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Engineering Aspect of
Vector Control

Environmental control
 is used to prevent breeding, nesting, and feeding of
vectors by source reduction and even through better
housing, windows, doors, screening.
 Environmental changes from road, dam, or pipeline
construction, deforestation, agriculture, and
irrigation can generate larval breeding sites.
 Environmental control can mostly be used in urban
and peri-urban areas, and mostly require community
participation and intersectoral collaboration.

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Source Reduction (Larval Control)

 Source reduction is the method of choice for mosquito control

when the mosquito species targeted are concentrated in a
small number of discrete habitats.
 The larval habitats may be destroyed by filling depressions
that collect water, by draining swamps, or by ditching marshy
areas to remove standing water.
 Container-breeding mosquitoes are particularly susceptible to
source reduction as people can be educated to remove or
cover standing water in cans, cups, and rain barrels around
houses.
 Mosquitoes that breed in irrigation water can be controlled
through careful water management

Larval control
 given the nature of the vectors, which tend basically
to breed everywhere in a small amount of water on
the surface of the ground, this approach can be
acceptable only under suitable mapping and
characterization of breeding sites, and will work
mainly in urban and peri-urban areas.
 Larval control can be attained through environmental
management, large space coverage, and community
participation, and can be done through chemical or
biological control.

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 Elimination of malaria in an area does not require

the elimination of all Anopheles mosquitoes capable
of transmitting the disease. In North America and
Europe, Anopheles mosquitoes capable of
transmitting malaria are still present, but the parasite
has been eliminated.
 Socio-economic improvements (e.g., houses with
screened windows, air conditioning) combined with
vector reduction efforts and effective treatment have
led to the elimination of malaria without the
complete elimination of the vectors.

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 Source reduction is an ideal

approach to mosquito
control. Mosquito larvae
are concentrated in defined
areas, and source reduction
eliminates mosquitoes
Source reduction: The burrow pit
before they reach the stage resulting from the activity of this
brickmaker in Kisian (western
that is responsible for Kenya) is a potential breeding site
disease transmission. for Anopheles larvae. Filling the
burrow pit would remove a source
of Anopheles adults

 Unfortunately, source reduction is not always

feasible. The larval habitats may be small, widely
dispersed, and transient. Anopheles gambiae, one of
the primary vectors of malaria in Africa, breeds in
numerous small pools of water that form due to
rainfall. The larvae develop within a few days,
escaping their aquatic environment before it dries
out. It is difficult, if not impossible, to predict when
and where the breeding sites will form, and to find
and treat them before the adults emerge. Therefore,
larval mosquito control for the prevention of malaria
in Africa has not been attempted on a large scale.

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Engineering Aspect of Vector Control

 Modification
 Manipulation

Environmental Modification
 A key factor in water management: storage
 Impoundments constructed: minimize vector
breeding along the shores
 The large number of isolated and scattered
breeding sites in the basin, so difficult to identify
and treat with larvicides before impoundment, are
submerged when the area is flooded to form
the reservoir.

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Environmental Modification
 In the absence of floating mats of vegetation,
mosquitoes do not breed in the deep waters far from
the reservoir margins.
 Nor is there any significant mosquito breeding along
steep, main shoreline exposed to wave wash.

Environmental Modification
 The areas of the impoundment subject to mosquito
problems lie within protected bights, hollows of the
shoreline.
 The water in such places is usually shallow and
filled with aquatic vegetation and floating material
where mosquito larvae find the necessary protection
from currents, wave action and wind.

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Environmental Modification
 The magnitude of the mosquito problem in
impounded waters is in direct proportion to the
length of the marshy shoreline.
 A marshy potential has been derived as a parameter
based on the following formula:
shoreline length (m) x √[reservoir area (m2)
reservoir volume (m3)

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Environmental Modification
 For shallow run-of-the-river reservoirs with a small
mean depth (volume/area) or where the number and
size of bights caused by streams produce a very long
shoreline, the marsh potential may be as high as 18
to 20 m-1
 For a deep reservoir with steep slopes in a
mountainous area, the marsh potential may be 2 to 3
m-1.

Environmental Modification
 Proper preparation of the reservoir site, and in particular the
clearing of trees and other vegetation, to ensure water surface
at all elevations.
 The purpose of the fluctuation is to draw down the water level. It
exposes larvae to the predation of their natural enemies. Furthermore,
some larvae and eggs are stranded in the dewatered area where they
die by desiccation or are eaten by ants and other predators before the
water is raised.
 All discernible depressions lying in the zone should be
connected with the main body of the reservoir by suitable
drainage structures.

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Environmental Modification
 Deepening and filling: topographical alteration
 Filling the marginal problem zones to a level above the
maximum water level of the impoundment
 Deepening the problem zone to a depth below the lower
limit of marginal growth invasion
 … without decreasing the storage volume of the
reservoir.
 Diking and dewatering
 Irigation

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Mosquito Control Impoundments

 A mosquito control impoundment is a salt marsh or mangrove
forest with an earthen dike around the perimeter that allows
the area to be artificially flooded during the mosquito
breeding season (approximately May to October). The salt
marsh mosquitoes Ochlerotatus taeniorrhynchus and
Ochlerotatus sollicitans will not lay their eggs upon standing
water. Instead, they oviposit upon moist soil; the eggs hatch
when flooded by tides or rainfall and develop into adults
within 5 - 7 days. Flooding marshes during the breeding
season, thus prevents oviposition and totally eliminates
mosquito production from the area without having to use
pesticides.

Impoundment Schematic

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 Impoundment dikes may surround the whole

marsh, or may stop at the upland edge. A
perimeter ditch borders the dike on the inside
and marks the area where material was
excavated for dike construction.
 A number of water control structures are used
to manipulate water levels within
impoundments; these include pumps, culverts,
spillways and weirs

 In the 1930s, an experiment demonstrated that

impounding could be an effective mosquito source
reduction technique (Hull and Dove 1939). However
the experiment was discontinued after water losses
due to evaporation and seepage through the dike
became excessive. By the early 1940s, the emphasis
shifted to the use of of DDT and other pesticides, so
that by the early 1950s, mosquito control in the area
relied almost exclusively upon chemicals.

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 In the mid 1950s, however, pesticide resistance started to

become a problem, and concerns about the toxic effects of
these chemicals upon the environment started to surface. In
1954, Brevard County renewed the emphasis on source
reduction and impounding. and the other counties along the
Lagoon soon followed suit. By 1959, more than 3,200 ha
(7,900 acres) of wetlands had been impounded (Provost
1968), and utlimately over 16,200 ha (40,000 acres) were
impounded (Rey and Kain 1989), all before the mid 1970s.
Most impoundments were constructed at about the mean high
water mark, and initially few of them had any type of
connection with the adjoining estuary. Most remained flooded
and closed year-round, but some were allowed to dewater
during the fall and winter.

Rotational Impoundment
Management (RIM)
 In the early 1960s, experiments with seasonal flooding of
impoundments found that flooding impoundments only
during the major mosquito producing season (approximately
May to October) was as effective in controlling mosquitoes as
year-round flooding (Clements and Rogers 1964). During the
remaining part of the year, water levels inside the
impoundment were allowed to fluctuate with the tides using
culverts installed through the impoundment dikes. This,
coupled with careful control of flooding elevations not only
permitted interchange between the marsh and the estuary, but
also prevented vegetation damage and replacement in many
of the experimental cells.

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 Controlling salt marsh mosquitoes.

 Retaining most of the woody vegetation (mostly black mangroves).
 Permitting access to the marsh by fish and other aquatic organisms.
 Allowing adequate flushing of the impoundment.
To accomplish these goals, the impoundment design included four culverts, a
spillway, and a permanent pump. During October to May, the culverts remained
open and allowed interchange between the Lagoon and the impoundment. During
the breeding season, water levels were maintained at the minimum necessary for
mosquito control. This was possible because the permanent pump allowed
replacement of water losses through evaporation and seepage. Two of the culverts
were equipped with flapgated risers, which opened when the water levels in the
Indian River were higher than in the impoundment, and thus allowed further
interchange, even during the "closed" summer period. The other two culverts were
closed using riser boards, which could be set at a given elevation, and thus, allow
excess water to spill over the top. These functioned in conjunction with the
spillway, which was simply a low area of the dike, to prevent vegetation damage
by excessively high water levels. This project, known as the Gumbo Limbo Island
Project

 RIM has proven to be an extremely effective

technique for minimizing adverse impacts of
impounding while maintaining the capabilities to
effectively control salt marsh mosquitoes. Moreover,
the water management capabilities associated with
active water level control in impoundments
(culverts, pumps, spillways, etc.) allow the
development of other management techniques
designed to provide different ecological benefits than
RIM.

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 Arguably, the most obvious benefit of hydrological

reconnection is that it allows access to the marsh
during most of the year to transient fish species that
utilize these marshes only during part of their life
cycle. The fact that culverts act as effective marsh
access pathways has been shown repeatedly by the
large catches of transient individuals using traps that
sample fish passing through the culverts
(Brockmeyer et al. 1997).

 In many impoundments where the vegetation

had been totally eliminated by overflooding
and high salinity, simply restoring the tidal
connection through culverts and monitoring
flooding elevations resulted in a quick
recovery of the herbaceous component (
Figure 6 ), with mangroves lagging somewhat
(Rey et al. 1990a).

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Vegetation recovery at Impoundment

 Moreover, the water management capabilities associated with

RIM have also allowed the manipulation of water levels to
control exotic and upland vegetation in some impoundments,
particularly in the Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge.
 Water quality improvements have also been identified in
many impoundments after hydrological reconnection,
particularly during the October-May open period. These
include lowered nutrient concentrations, increased dissolved
oxygen levels, and more "natural" salinity fluctuations.
Management of excessive sulfide to prevent fish mortality has
also been made possible by the use of pumps and culverts
associated with RIM (Rey et al. 1992).

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 For some mosquito species, habitat elimination is not possible. For

these species, chemical insecticides can be applied directly to the
larval habitats.

 Other methods, which are less disruptive to the environment, are usually
preferred:
 Oils may be applied to the water surface, suffocating the larvae and pupae.
Most oils in use today are rapidly biodegraded.
 Biological control agents include toxins from the bacterium Bacillus
thuringiensis var. israelensis (Bti). These products can be applied in the same
way as chemical insecticides. They are very specific, affecting only
mosquitoes, black flies, and midges.
 Insect growth regulators such as methroprene. Methoprene is specific to
mosquitoes and can be applied in the same way as chemical insecticides.
 Mosquito fish (Gambusia affinis) are effective in controlling mosquitoes in
larger bodies of water.
 Other potential biological control agents, such as fungi (e.g., Laegenidium
giganteum) or mermithid nematodes (e.g., Romanomermis culicivorax), are
less efficient for mosquito control and are not widely used.

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