Where have all the fire ants gone?

Fire ants are evil incarnate. They are a horribly invasive species that have conquered the entire southern U.S. since their accidental introduction into Alabama from Brazil in the 1930s. They are a major reason the horny toad (Texas horned lizard) is a threatened species, since they devour the lizard's eggs and drive out red harvester ants that are the horny toad's diet. They also blind newborn calves and deer with their stings, are devastating to ground nesting birds and hurt like hell when they bite you. I spend a good bit of money every year on Amdro fire ant bait to keep them under control in our yard.

Last year after one particular series of heavy rains, the wife and I counted 22 mounds that popped up in our yard overnight. That's the pattern with fire ants--rain is the big revealer, and they flourish in wet conditions. We've had heavy rains moving through the area at least once a week for the past month or so, and the Blaschke household has been bracing for the coming invasion. A friend of ours lives 15 miles away in Seguin, and she reports that the infestation is out of control--dozens and dozens of mounds popping up faster than they can be treated.

But that, strangely enough, hasn't happened here. In the past three weeks, I've spread bait out over a total of four mounds, and none of them are what I'd characterize as huge. The ants are still around and as vicious as ever--I have three blisters on my foot from this afternoon's encounter as testament--but there just aren't that many of them now. Why is that? Maybe, just maybe, an experimental program begun last year to introduce a South American fly that uses fire ants as larval hosts is beginning to have a real impact:

"We've been releasing a different type of phorid fly in New Braunfels to see how effective it will be in the controlling fire ants," said Molly Keck, Extension entomologist for Bexar County. "We're hoping this one will be even more deadly to them than the other species of phorid fly we've been using throughout the state for fire ant management."

If the release is successful, additional releases of the new phorid fly species will likely be forthcoming, she said.

Phorid flies kill fire ants by "dive-bombing" them in order to lay their eggs in the ant's thorax, Keck explained. Once hatched, the fly larvae migrates into the head of the ant, eating the contents. Eventually, the ant's head falls off.

The new fly, Pseudacton curvatis, is imported from South America and has been acquired though the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Animal and Plant Inspection Service, Keck said.

Well, that's interesting and all, but how do I know that we're even in an area where these flies would be around to work their magic?

An initial release of about 75,000 of these flies was completed over three days – June 14, 20 and 23 – in the southeastern part of the city.

"This type of phorid fly is different from the Pseudacton tricuspis, which is already being used in several counties as a biological fire ant control," Keck said. "It's more robust and prefers the smaller-sized worker ants. It also handles cold weather better than tricuspus, so it's less likely to die out during fall or winter."

The new fly's aggressiveness toward smaller worker ants is especially useful in eliminating fire ant colonies with multiple queens, Keck said.

"Those colonies usually have large numbers of the smaller worker ants in and around them," she said. "So they provide more ‘targets' for this fly. And these types of colonies are abundant throughout the state."

Our subdivision is literally at the southeastern tip of New Braunfels. I can walk across the street and move out of city limits. We are surrounded on four sides by farmland and cow pastures, and on summer days you can look over the green fields and see the grass broken by brown fire ant mounds every 5-10 feet or so. The flies are here, and they're working. To which all I can say is "yay!"

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No HEROES?

Didn't the latest episode of Heroes air on Monday? Doesn't Jayme have an opinion on it? Well, yes and yes. It aired, and I have an opinion. I just don't know what that opinion is since I haven't seen it. I've been absurdly busy and missed the Monday airing, and haven't had an hour to put aside in order to view the thing online. Rest assured, though, that when I do I'll post my thoughts here.

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Spurs top Suns

So the Spurs outlasted the Suns 111-106 in one of the hardest-fought (not to mention bloodiest) playoff games thus far in the NBA postseason. Not to slight the Jazz or the Warriors (or the entire Eastern Conference for that matter) but the San Antonio-Phoenix series could practically be for that league championship.

And I missed the game. For some reason, I had it in my head as a 6:30 p.m. tipoff. At 2:30, I was at the zoo with my kids, navigating a wet, misty drizzle on rain-slicked sidewalks. We had a pretty good time, actually, and Orion learned the joys of chasing miniature goats in the petting zoo and splashing through puddles on the sidewalk.

And while I mentioned the Jazz up above, can anyone tell me why Jeff Van Gundy is still the coach of the Houston Rockets? Their collapse against Utah in game 5 is inexcusable. With talents like Tracy McGrady and Yao Ming anchoring your team, you shouldn't be struggling to earn a fifth seed only to get bounced in the first round. That team should be challenging for the division and conference title every season. Van Gundy is obviously the wrong man for this collection of players--as I've said for the past three seasons--and needs to make way for someone who brings something new to the table.

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Friday Night Videos

Remember when Paula Abdul was relevant? Before she became a loopy self-parody on American Idol with lawsuits over botched manicures? She never had the strongest voice, but early on she was great at picking material that suited her and even better with choreography. I wasn't familiar with any of the Bob Fosse stuff back when the video for Cold Hearted, but boy did it sure catch my attention. Since then, I've seen touring productions of Chicago and the River North Dance Company, and all I can say is that my impression of Paula Abdul, circa 1988, has gone up considerably. But that still doesn't change the fact that I think she's one of the biggest flakes you'll see outside of a box of breakfast cereal.



Previously on Friday Night Videos... Duran Duran.

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Schirra space

Crap. I've just seen a news alert that Wally Schirra, one of the original Mercury 7 astronauts, has died in California. He always struck me as a relatively down-to-earth fellow (pun intended) and I'm saddened by his passing. I've had his book, Schirra Space, on my bookshelf for a number of years, but haven't gotten around to reading it. I think now I will.

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HEROES: String Theory

The writers of Heroes have done something very, very smart. All this season, the coming nuclear blast in New York City has been the focal point of the show, and the various heroes' motivations. By flinging Hiro and Ando five years into the future, after the blast and the subsequent aftermath, the show has successfully raised the stakes tenfold while maintaining the urgency of the nuclear deadline. With the introduction of Malcolm McDowell as Linderman, an Ozymandias character if ever there was one, the show came perilously close to aping The Watchmen. But the bleak "mutant hysteria" of this possible future moves the storyline into a dark interpretation of Marvel comics themes, whereas up until this point I feel (rightly or wrongly) that the overall narrative was more driven by DC themes. It's no longer a Watchmen ripoff, and the season can successfully close out this storyline (a graphic novel analog in DVD boxed set form) while sewing the seeds for a larger, more urgent storyline in season two.

There were many comic conventions in this episode. Future Hiro and current Hiro had some interesting interactions, although the fact that future Hiro doesn't speak with much of an accent was distracting. And future Hiro is a bit dull, personality wise, although they did a good--is expected--job of explaining why. Showing all the possible future versions of the various characters was a fun, if somewhat timeworn approach. Sylar's big reveal was a classic super villain moment, and the fact that there was actual super-hero ass-kicking going on was very, very fun. I find it more than a little flawed in the logic department that Sylar would opt for concentration camp-style extermination of these meta-humans rather than absorb their abilities into himself, but that's a relatively minor quibble. All in all, quite the good episode.

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Mission accomplished

Today marks the four year anniversary of President Bush's famous "Mission Accomplished" photo op aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln, where he declared an end to major combat operations in Iraq.

At the time, the Sunni insurgency in Iraq was estimated at around 5,000 fighters. Today it is estimated to total some 25,000 fighters.

At the time, the Shiite militias were estimated to total around 5,000 fighters. Today they total roughly 50,000 fighters.

Current U.S. troop levels deployed in Iraq to quell the rising violence have climbed over 150,000. At the same time, the resurgent Taliban (remember those guys? The ones who helped Osama Bin Laden attack the U.S.?) have retaken parts of Afghanistan and are increasingly aggressive in engaging NATO forces in that country.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Vice President Cheney continues to assert discredited justifications for the war, such as that Iraq was trying to buy yellow cake to build atomic weapons, that Saddam Hussein was cooperating with Al Quaeda...

Well, the long and short of it is that I feel so much safer today than I did four years ago, knowing all those bad Iraqi terrorists have been beaten and no longer pose a threat to us. Sleep well, friends.

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