By Blaine Bug Crew
The summer of 2024 is an exciting time for the Blaine Bug Crew. This represents the beginning of warm weather and an exciting season of biological control. We are looking forward to continuing our fight to keep Blaine County native, green, and noxious-weed free. We have been out in the field already and are excited to report our Dalmation toadflax seed head eating weavels, Mecinus janiformus, are already emerged as adults and are happliy eating Dalmation toadflax even before the snow has left the Wood River Valley peaks.
This year on our crew we have some new recruits as well as verteran crew members. This is the first year for RaeLyn Van Kleeck and Sienna Norman while Kaitlyn Denning, Chase Norman, and Christopher Romero have returned to the crew once more with several years under our belts. The moist, cool spring has generated very healthy weed popuplations, which means we have our work cut out for us.
In addition to monitoring vegetation and insect populations, the bug crew is also responsible to educate the public about noxious-weeds, give presentations to civic organizations, be a presence at fairs and parades, and make sure that noxious-weeds and their predator agents come in contact with one another. If you are out for a drive in Blaine County’s beautiful bi-ways and see kids with tape measures, monitoring equipment, or sweep nets feel free to stop by and say “hi” to your local bug crew.