Perhaps you’ve been thinking about registering your home for the 90-metre buffer zone to reduce your exposure to malathion but you just haven’t gotten around to it, or perhaps you need just a little more convincing.
Here are 8 reasons why you should register your home or apartment today!
1. Save their natural predators: Malathion is an indiscriminate pesticide so it will kill insects that eat mosquitoes such as dragonflies. So, how is it helpful to remove species that would naturally reduce mosquito populations?
2. Help rebuild the bee population: There is a decline in bee populations so why worsen the problem?
3. Precautionary principle: We don’t know all the potential negative effects it has on our health. Perhaps it can cause cancer with repeated exposure.
4. To influence City Council: By saying no to malathion, this will pressure City Officials to invest in more natural biological alternatives such as breeding dragonflies.
5. Reduction in effectiveness: Mosquitoes can build resistance to malathion, so it eventually will not be as effective.
6. Waste of tax dollars: Only 1 drop of malathion in 1000 drops actually reaches a mosquito. The City is wasting its money since it needs a lot of that pesticide to make a difference.
7. Save time: You won’t have to worry about following Health Canada’s recommendations to minimize exposure to malathion. For example, the government recommends that you “cover outdoor furniture and play equipment or rinse them off with water after spraying is finish”. That is just one of the many things they recommend. That’s lots of work!
8. Help Taz reach his goal: Taz Stuart, the City’s entomologist, wants Winnipeg to eventually have a 100% biological mosquito control program. Imagine if the majority of Winnipeggers registered, then the City will have no choice but to find alternatives!
To find out how to register, visit the City of Winnipeg’s Insect Control Branch webpage. If you want more information, read our recent Pesticide buffer zone post and Sierra Club Canada’s Malathion Fact Sheet.
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