CONGRATULATIONS Team!

On Saturday, December 6th, the Don't Try This at Home lego league travelled to Rockledge, Florida for the First Lego League Robotics Competition. In our very first competition ever, we were shocked and very excited to learn that we won the Director's Award for "Best Team Overall"!

Here is the video clip of the awards ceremony;

First Lego League Robotics Competition Award Ceremony from Eve on Vimeo.


You can tell that no team was more surprised than we were!

We would really like to thank everyone who helped us along the way,...especially our great Coach Mark Lavigne and his wife Sonja, all of the moms and dads who helped, Dr. Rui-De Xue and the staff at the Anastasia Mosquito Control District, Cunningham Creek Elementary school, the super fantastic Legooners Team and all others who gave us expert guidance and advice at our very first practice session in Merrit Island in November. Thanks so much!

Welcome!

Welcome to our web page. Here we will show you what we are learning, share photos and videos of our work as well as our research adventures.

On Monday, October 6th, we visited the Anastasia Mosquito Control District and learned some new details about mosquitos and what types of methods they use to control them . In the upcoming posts we will tell you about what we learned when we visited there, as well as what we've learned from our own research.

Sources for our project

The following is a list of resources we used for our project on mosquitos and climate:

The Center for Disease Control http://www.cdc.gov/
Anastasia Mosquito Control District http://www.anastasiamcd.org/
The Florida Climate Center http://coaps.fsu.edu/climate_center/
Clarke Mosquito Company http://www.clarkemosquito.com/product_detail.cfm?productid=112&categoryid=6&parentlist=4,6
Science Daily http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2004/07/040716081706.htm
Precision Precipitation Maps/average US rainfall http://www.wrcc.dri.edu/pcpn/us_precip.gif
Mosquitos.org http://www.mosquitoes.org/LifeCycle.html
US Environmental Protection Agency http://www.epa.gov/pesticides/health/mosquitoes/
The Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services http://www.doacs.state.fl.us/ai/main/eee.shtml
About.com http://jacksonville.about.com/od/historystatsfunfacts/a/yellowjack.htm

We would also like to especially thank Dr. Rui-De (Rudy) Xue from the Anastasia Mosquito Control District as well as the rest of the staff there for their time and energy in our visit to their facility as well as their input on our presentation at Cunningham Creek Elementary School for Ms. Patterson's second grade class. Dr. Xue also took time to email any additional information we needed. THANK-YOU!

Our 'Skeeter Skit

This is a run-through of the skit that we wrote and worked on as a team. Soon we will post the final skit with our props so be sure to check back here soon!

Presenting our research to the community

This is our skit that we performed at Cunningham Creek Elementary School on October 29th for Mrs. Patterson's second grade class. Some of the representatives from Anastasia Mosquito Control were also there to watch what we put together. We had a lot of fun answering the kids' questions and making them laugh with our skit.

mosquito skit from kurt ebbers on Vimeo.

Annual rain fall in Jacksonville, Florida

Here is a map of the U.S.A and its annual rain fall

The annual rain fall in Florida is about 50-60 inches a year. That is the annual rain fall for most of the eastern and mid western U.S.A.. When rain comes it fills up most of the ponds, bird baths, anything that can hold water. Then mosquitoes start to breed when it becomes summer. That is not the only thing that effects the mosquito population. When high tide comes in the salt marshes it will leave small pools for the mosquitoes to breed in.

The life cycle of the mosquito

In the life cycle of the mosquito there are 5 stages. The first stage of the mosquito life cycle is the egg. The eggs of the mosquito's are laid in egg rafts. The mosquito's die if the egg raft is separated. Although some of the mosquito's live during the separation but this is very rare. The next stage of the mosquito is the larva. the larva stage is when the mosquito breaks out of the egg and looks like a small worm. It feeds and after a male he morphs into a pupa. In the pupa stage the mosquito is dormant. it only breaths through it's small little breathing tube. Then it emerges from the pupa . It slowly comes out and stays on the water held up by the surface. A female mosquito has to suck blood to lay her eggs. This is the life cycle of the mosquito.

Why mosquitos are a problem in Jacksonville, Florida

Due to Florida's humid subtropical climate, mosquito's can be a serious problem as pests and carriers of disease like the West Nile virus and Eastern Equine Encephalitis. Because of these diseases in Florida, there has been a rise in the awareness and need to prevent death and sickness in humans and animals. The diseases are currently being tested for cures. People are turning to find out prevention methods so they do not get the viruses. Mosquitos are also a problem for people with livestock and people that own animals for they can be bitten and disease can spread through their body.

Solutions to the Problem Currently Being Used and Tested #1--Golden Bear Oil

Golden Bear Oil
Mosquito Larvicide: GB-1111
Research by: Alonzo

Golden Bear Oil is a type of petroleum oil that has no smell or color. It is used to kill mosquito larvae in swamps, ditches, flooded pastures, storm drains, and other areas where mosquitoes breed. It kills mosquitoes by creating a film that prevents oxygen transport. Golden Bear Oil can be applied by hand, can, or truck. Golden Bear Oil is sold by Clarke Mosquito Control Products, Inc. Their Florida office told us this oil costs $13.50 per gallon. It is used in Florida. In 2007, St. Johns County applied 100 gallons of Golden Bear Oil. It is best applied in summer temperatures.  They think it is safe for the environment. Some scientists think differently. They believe that it could be dangerous to baby ducks. They should STOP using Golden Bear Oil if it hurts ducks!
Golden Bear oil is not harmful to humans but does affect some species of what the Anastasia Mosquito Control district calls "non targets". 

Solution #2--Cinnamon Oil (currently being tested)

Cinnamon oil seeps into the pupa's breathing tube and chokes it.  It is currently being tested in China but is not in use.  It comes from the Cinnamon tree which smells really good! 

Solution #3: BTI

Bacillus thuringiensis
Bacil⋅lus thu⋅rin⋅gi⋅en⋅sis [thoo-rin-jee-en-sis]
What is it? A bacteria in the soil.

Who discovered Bti? Two different men, a Japanese named Ishiwata in 1901 and by Ernst Berliner in 1911 when he was studying a disease in flour moth caterpillars.

How it works: The mosquito larvae ingest it which makes it's nerves very alert which causes stomach rupture. Use any of the products in the picture in areas where mosquitoes breed. The Anastasia Mosquito Control uses this product now where we live.

Permethrin

The Anastasia Mosquito Control District uses permethrin to kill mosquitos here in our area.

Ideas on how to solve the problem,... #1: Robot Mosquito Repeller by Karsten

We should come up with a robot, that can see a mosquito 100 feet away. Once it detects the mosquito, it goes around spraying the area with powerful sprayers. In the sprayers is chemical that kills the pupa, the larvae, the egg and the adult. It would be called All-Spray. We should make the Robot blend in with its surroundings. We should also put that chemical in lakes, rivers, bird baths and ponds. This All-Spray would only kill mosquitoes and NOT other animals. Maybe this could help our environment with mosquito control.
This is what the robot will do!

Idea #2--Dragonflies-- by Micah

Everyone should have dragonflies in their yards so that they would eat all of the mosquitos around their house. This would be good for the environment because there are no chemicals being used.

Idea #3-- The Fountain Bomb--by Chad

The Fountain Bomb would be dropped from a plane above a body of water. It is shaped much like an average torpedo, although it is not an explosive. They drop it from at least 100 feet above the target water. After falling, the bomb-shaped container splits in half. A switch is flipped and a little red box inside ejects it's parachute and slowly and easily falls into the water. As soon as it hits water, the red box splits in half as well and the fountain with a water-proof battery is ejected. The fountain is connected to one of the halves by string and is completely floatable. The fountain will then turn on, sucking water in and shooting water out, causing motion. This motion or rippling effect will break open the mosquito egg raft thus killing the eggs and preventing them from hatching.

Idea #4--Mosquito Submarine--by Zachary

The mosquito submarine travels in ponds and lakes. When it spots a mosquito or it's larvae, it has a retractable arm that moves up out of the water and sprays the mosquitos with a chemical. I would make this solar powered so that you didn't have to worry about replacing batteries.

Idea #5--Mosquito Eating Pet Law--by Alonzo

I think there should be a law that everyone in Jacksonville should have a frog, a gecko, and a bat as pets.

A frog can eat the mosquitoes near water. A gecko can eat the mosquitoes on the walls and ceilings of buildings. A bat can eat up to 600 mosquitoes an hour.

That is my mosquito solution!

Idea #6---Suffocator Insenarator--by Landon

My idea is the oxygen depleting dome, or the Suffocator Incenarator.

This contraption is a dome that pours a mosquito attractant that only attracts the female mosquito--(our enemy)-- to this trap of doom. When the mosquito gets there the capacity of the dome will fill up until the dome is ready to shut. When the dome shuts it closes to an air tight seal and the dome uses a vacuum to suck all of the air out of the dome. Mosquitoes need air to breath. When the dome is closed and the oxygen is depleted, it will take at least five minutes to kill off all of the mosquitoes. When all of the mosquitoes are dead an electronic arm comes through and sweeps all of the dead mosquitoes into a schute where they will fill up in a storage container until it gets full. When the container fills up, it will burn the mosquitoes and use the ashes to make very cheap and very green fertilizer that can be used to fertilize lawns or crops.

Idea #7--The Strainer--by Paul

My idea to kill mosquitoes is to get a big container filled with

water and sensors in it so when a lot of larvae get in,

we will know. A truck will come and pick the container

up and go to a tunnel that has a strainer at the top and

pour the water down. The water will go through but the

larvae won't. They will dry up and die.

Idea #8--Skeeter Eaters by Ryan

My idea is to put fish in every pond. Not just any fish-- mosquito fish. They eat mosquito larva. we won't be able to enact this right away but as the fish eat more they can mate so it is a self perpetuating. If we do this I think that the mosquito population will go down a lot.

By Ryan