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Mosquito Control (was RE: Ratio?)



> Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2002 12:42:34 -0800
> From: Thomas Barr <tcbiii at earthlink_net>

>  Is there anything that will kill mosquitos and not harm anything
> > else in the pond?
> 
> Mosquito fish:-) Call Mosquito Abatement. They will give them to you or you
> can get some guppies or livebearers. A blue gill or sunfish would work. Some
> sunfish eat small snails which eat algae. Any small tough fish that loves a
> meal.

Tough to challenge one of the true Gurus, here, but I must disagree with Tom
on this one.

Our Desert Springs Action Committee <http://www.tkphotos.com/dsac/> spends
four long weekends every year trying to undo some of the damage caused by
introducing fish, often for mosquito control, where they do far more harm
than good.

*Gambusia affinis (or holbrooki)* are the favorite of county agents who
distribute them ignorantly and to no net good. These so-called mosquito
fish, and their guppy/molly cousins, eat few mosquito larvae, but are
ferocious predators on the eggs and fry of many native fish. 

When academic ichthyologists complained and refused to publish pseudoscience
to promote their bureacracy, the mosquito abatement crowd even formed their
own "professional" society so they could continue to support each other.
"Peer review" made incestuous!

For some facts on this issue, please check out http://www.gambusia.net/ and
the references, there.

Bottom line: NEVER introduce a non-native fish without checking with
competent ichthyological advise (and reading your local laws). We still have
a couple of Bay Area counties handing out "damnbusia" despite the fact that
our local sticklebacks, *Lucania parva* (aka the "Three-Tenors Fish") and
speckled dace are far and away more effective at that job. Until livebearers
and Cichlids finally eat all their eggs and young, endangered desert pupfish
and springfish are also much better at mosquito control.

Wright

-- 
Wright Huntley -- 650 843-1240 -- 866 Clara Dr. Palo Alto CA 94303 
                    http://www.sfbaka.net.

Nobody every recommended a dictatorship aiming at ends other than
those he himself approved. He who advocates dictatorship always 
advocates the unrestricted rule of his own will.  Ludwig von Mises