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AJ Jones: With a wetter than normal spring in northern Michigan, experts say the number of mosquitoes could grow this summer. To get a full update on the pesky insect, WCMU's Tina Sawyer talked with Bill Stanuszek, the director of the Saginaw County Mosquito Abatement Commission. Stanuszek starts the conversation by explaining why wetter than normal weather could produce more of the pest.
Bill Stanuszek: What we've been dealing with this spring has been one group of mosquitoes. In particular, in the state of Michigan, is our spring mosquitoes, which love our woodlots, our flooded woodlots and lowlands that, for those areas of Michigan that have those, they're long lived. So, if we get a lot of rain and we're left with flooded areas out in our landscapes, it could even be buckets that were left out to dry or things around our yard that hold water. It takes seven to 10 days after a heavy rain, where you see this water all over the environment, to hatch out the mosquitoes. Unfortunately, the mosquitoes know where these habitats are, they lay eggs in those low flood spots and in 10 days you get the adults flying out after the larva hatch and grow up. They grow up slowly due to cool temps in the water in the spring, but with these summer temperatures now upon us, they're quite active. They're looking for blood meals in the evening when you have warm, calm temperatures, but now it's starting to warm up. So that probably explains warming up around the day night cycle is what's driving that extra biting.
Tina Sawyer: Bill, could you give us an update about the West Nile report out of South Northwest Michigan. I know people here, there's been a case of it in that area, and they automatically think it's a human, but that's not the case.
BS: What they found this year for the 2026 mosquito season is two collections of mosquito samples, a group of mosquitoes that come from a trap, that were submitted to the state for testing. And those came back positive in the Grand Rapids zip code and in the Wyoming zip code. So currently, and this is not uncommon, although it seems early, but as you mentioned, mosquitoes are out and they can transmit disease. So, it makes sense we're going to find it, and we've confirmed that West Nile virus is out in the environment. So where to start? Wearing a repellent when you are encountering mosquitoes that are biting. A lot of these viruses that mosquitoes transmit are hosted, if you will, in birds and in mammals out in the environment. And while these animals may not get sick from it, they can amplify the virus. And if the mosquito populations go up, more mosquitoes, more feeding, more host and more virus transmission. And eventually it gets to a point where there's so much in the system, the threat to humans goes higher later in the season because there's more virus in the.
TS: Well, Bill, since we're on the subject of mosquito-borne viruses, the Eastern Equine Encephalitis, or EEE as it's known, normally found in horses, it's delivered by mosquitoes, and sometimes in humans it's rare, but it can be deadly. What's the forecast for EEE for the summer?
BS: It's early, and we're always cautious. It's been a couple years, but I think it was 2019 and 20 that we had epidemics, if you will, where we had human cases. It's a very sneaky disease; what I mean by that is it's awfully quiet for a while, but when it rears its head, it's very loud. So, it's very early in the year and usually with our Eastern equine encephalitis, that really starts to, if it's going to be a year for it, it'll start making us notice it later into the summer.
TS: Our pets too, how do we protect them? They can't be sprayed with the DEET.
BS: Your heartworm medication, your flea and tick, all-in-one tablets, that's very important because just about all of our biting mosquitoes in Michigan are capable of carrying heartworms. Things you can do around your yard to help yourself out is if you are collecting water, water collects in different containers outside, maybe you're watering plants, make sure you're properly screening so mosquitoes can't get into that water and lay eggs or you're eliminating or just dumping that water every now and then.
