RI, MA EHS Pest Control Blog

Three firefighters, three residents and two ambulance workers were sickened Monday night by fumes from a pesticide fogger set off in a San Mateo County trailer.

The San Mateo County Sheriff's Office and the Redwood City Fire Department responded to Sequoia Trailer Park in North Fair Oaks after receiving a 911 call requesting medical aid at about 8:10 p.m., Redwood City spokesman Malcolm Smith said.

Two residents who had apparently been using a fogger to exterminate fleas were found inside their trailer in a cloud of pesticide, Smith said.

Those two residents and a neighbor were washed off and taken to a hospital to be treated for shortness of breath and eye irritation, Smith said.

Three firefighters were also taken to a hospital as a precaution and later released.

A hazardous materials team responded to the trailer park to monitor the situation. No evacuations were necessary, according to the fire department.

Fire officials reminded residents to follow all written instructions when handling household chemicals.

Squirrel Tests Positive For Plague At Campsite

A ground squirrel trapped during routine monitoring at the Cedar Grove Campground on Palomar Mountain tested positive for plague, the San Diego County Department of Environmental Health reported Thursday. No plague-infected rodents were discovered in the county last year, according to the DEH. Plague is a bacterial disease carried by wild rodents that can be transmitted to humans through the bite of infected fleas, according to the DEH.

The agency placed warning signs in the area so visitors could take precautions to avoid flea contact.

"It is not unusual to find plague in our local mountains in the summer months, so campers should always avoid contact with squirrels and their fleas," said DEH Director Jack Miller. "Set up tents away from squirrel burrows, do not feed the squirrels and warn your children not to play with squirrels."

The agency also advises avoiding contact with wild animals, particularly ground squirrels and chipmunks; not touching sick or dead animals; and keeping pets on a leash or leaving them at home.

Someone who becomes ill within one week of visiting an area known to have plague should contact a doctor immediately, according to the DEH.

Symptoms include a sudden onset of fever, chills and tender, swollen lymph nodes.

The agency said there have never been any known human cases of plague contracted here.

George Williams,
General Manager - Staff Entomologist

Pest Control, RI, Pest Control, MA 

Fleas: Endemic Typhus Cases On The Rise

Endemic (flea-borne) typhus, an illness that prior to 2006 was considered rare in Orange County, continues to occur, with five confirmed or probable endemic typhus cases reported to the Orange County Health Care Agency in the past three months. However, there have been no reports to date in Laguna Niguel.

In the recent cases, four of the people are adults, and one is younger than 18. Endemic typhus is transmitted by the bite of infected fleas, in particular those from cats, opossums and rodents, although other animals may carry the fleas.

The most recently affected individuals live in the northern part of the county, but because these animals are present throughout the county, human cases may occur in any area. Typhus occurs naturally in Southern California, with eight cases reported in Orange County for 2011 to date, six each in 2010 and 2009, 15 in 2008, six during 2007 and one in 2006. Prior to 2006, the last case reported in Orange County was in 1993.

Source = Associated Press

George Williams,
General Manager - Staff Entomologist

Pest Control, RI, Pest Control, MA 

Fleas have been around for millions of years and can live for about 100 days! Here's more interesting facts about fleas.

• Fleas do not fly. They jump from one place to another.
• A pair of fleas can produce 2,000 offspring in their lifetime.
• The Flea life cycle is similar to the butterfly life cycle. Female Fleas lay eggs that turn in to grub-like larvae. The larvae then develop into pupae and settle inside a cocoon. They wait for a host to start their life and suck blood.
• In a typical room, 5 percent of the fleas will be found on pets, 10 percent flea cocoons in the carpets, 35 percent flea larvae and 50 percent flea eggs, again in the carpets.
• When something warm moves by the pupae, they unzip the cocoon and jump on the animal or human body. All this happens in three seconds and the flea can jump as high as four feet.
• A flea can jump up to 8 inches high. That is 150 times its own height. If you could do this, you'd be able to leap over even tall skyscrapers.
• It is important to get rid of fleas by simple methods as these insects cause serious diseases in humans and pets.

George Williams
General Manager - Staff Entomologist

Pest Control, RI, Pest Control, MA

Flea's Jump Analyzed By Scientists

The age-old mystery of how fleas jump 100 times their height has been solved - and it's their toes not legs that are key.

It has long been known that fleas store the energy needed to catapult themselves up in an elastic-like pad above the hind legs.

But there has been 44 years of constant debate about how the tiny insects use this energy to travel around 100 times their height.

And now, in the first study of its kind, two researchers used high speed recording equipment to examine the exact movements involved and proved that they push off using their toes.

Using hedgehog fleas, they filmed 51 jumps from 10 of the animals.

In the majority of jumps, two parts of the flea's complicated legs - the toe and knee - were in contact with the ground for the push off.

But in 10 per cent of the jumps, only the toe touched the ground.

The duo could see that the insects continued accelerating during take-off - even when the knee was no longer pushing down - and those that jumped without using the knee accelerated in exactly the same way as those that jumped using both the knee and toe.

Furthermore, when they looked at the flea's leg with scanning electron microscopy - a microscope in which a finely focused beam of electrons is scanned across them - the shin and toe had gripping claws but the knee was completely smooth - so it couldn't get a good enough grip to push off.

They suspected that the insects push down through the shin onto the toe, as previous research has suggested, but they needed a mathematical model to reproduce the flea's movement and prove their argument.

Source = The telegraph

George Williams,
General Manager - Staff Entomologist

Pest Control, RI, Pest Control, MA

Fleas’ ‘Feet’ Unleash That Spectacular Leap

When fleas jump, it is no ordinary leap. The insects can shoot as high as 38 times their body length, about three inches. And the acceleration is so intense that fleas have to withstand 100 Gs, or 100 times the force of gravity. “You and I pass out if we experience five Gs,” said Malcolm Burrows, an expert on insect jumping at the University of Cambridge.

Dr. Burrows and his Cambridge colleague Gregory Sutton obtained the fleas from Tiggywinkles to try to answer a question that had vexed naturalists for centuries: how fleas manage their spectacular jumps. They report that the insects turn themselves into catapults, storing up energy that they release as they push off the ground with what passes, in fleas, for feet.

• It takes about a thousandth of a second for a flea to hurl itself into the air.
• Fleas generate a hundred times more power than their muscles can actually provide.

Exerpts from NY Times.com

George Williams,
General Manager - Staff Entomologist

Pest Control, RI, Pest Control, MA