Imperial Valley press., 1922-07-12

Inc presence or fl1eS always denotes
to the sanitary inspector or anyone
understanding their habits, that there
is dirt or filth nearby. Freedom from
flies means cleanliness of stables,
alleys, corrals, and of the premises in
general. Flies breed only in moist
places that contain food for the larva,
or maggots, when the eggs hatch. The
favorite spot is fresh horse manure,
but may be any manure, garbage, slops,
sewage, dirty milk cans, milk soaked
soil, ditch banks, unclean feed troughs.
open privies, exposed sour milk, decay
ing animal or vegetable matter, and
similar places, where conditions of
food, moisture, and temperature are
proper.
Our chief consideration is the house
fly, since it is most common and does
the most damage. Eggs are laid in
moist places, Matching in a half to two
days, depending on the temperature. Im
four or five days the larva are full
grown and crawl to dry place to
pupate, which changes the yellowish-
white worm to q dark brown form like
large wheat kernel, known as
sleeper or pupa. The fly developes
ihoiuO tiiio cast anu Ill lOuI VI llNb uuNS
more emerges practically full size,
grayish i'll appearance and with wings
rolled up. Four to eight days later it
is ready to lay eggs. Usually II to IA
days will carry a generation from eggs
to laying adult.
Two Fly Seasons Here
In the valley, winter is too cool and
summer too dry for much breeding, ex-
cept in most favored spots, as fresh
horse manure. Thus we have here two
fly seasons year, spring and fall,
when conditions are favorable. Consid.
ing its habits OF breeding in and living
and feeding SO much upon filth, it is
no wonder the house fly is called our
most dangerous and the filthest of all
insects.
The real danger of the house flv is
in the contamination of food and dairy
products by direct contact. The flv's
body is covered with short hairs and
bristles. Several hundred flies were
caught by an investigator and cleansed
well to determine how many bacteria
could be found upon them The aver
age was 1,250,000-one and a quarter
million bacteria per fly. Now imagine
a fly coming from the stable, corral. or
worse place, and bathing in your
soup, coffee, or glass of milk, or tasting
about from dish to dish of your food.
4ou don t know how many of the mil
hon and quarter bacteria on the
average fly is tuberculosis, typhoid.
cholera, or dysentery, Consider the
baby, who is helpless to combat the
danger and is most easily victim of
intestinal troubles
Deadly To Infants
A large part of the nearly $4,000
infant deaths from dysenterv annually
IN the United States is due to infection
by the filthy fly. A careless public is
responsible for leaving its filth ex
posed. The fly's intestines NAV he
heavily charged with disease material
upon which the insect has fed, so the
fly speck - may be dangerous. You
can now begin to see why the dairy
service is particular in requiring the
legal fly tight milk house and protect
ing dairy products at all times against
any contact by these dirty insects
However, better than this is the teach
ing OF dalrymen and ranchers to fight
ines at their weakest point, the breed
ing place.
"A good campaign by local health an
,horltles backed by the state board of
nealth, dairy service, farm bureau.
1arm advisor and home demonstration
puDiic schools, and the very important
public press, through a fly week, would
awaken all to the necessity and
methods of fly control. Few ranches
out would gladly be rid of the pests
IL they knew how to accomplish it.
How To Eradicate Flies
we can give here a few prineiples
or fly control. First examine the
premises for breeding places. and If
you cannot recognize them, call in
someone who can ferret them out. With
a stick dig into various suspicions
places and look for larvae and brown
pupa cases. Second, clean up these
places or prevent flies from lavinc
eggs or the larvae from developing in
them. Manure should be thinlv spread
daliy directly to the field, where tbe
RAPID drying will prevent larval devel.
opment. If this is impossible. build y
fly tlght bin with a screened ventilator
at the top and haul out manure once
or twice a week and spread thinlv,
Manure can be piled in narrow straight
sided piles, building daily against the
END and compacting very well. The
Sides of this pile become too drv and
the interior too hot for Matching eggs.
These methods will apply chiefly to