Plan Proposed to Fight Black Flies

Hoping to kill those relentlessly annoying buffalo gnats--better known as black flies--before they become a problem, City Councilman John Ferraro on Friday introduced a motion that would allow the city to spend $50,000 to wipe out the ugly critters.

In years past, the black flies have bred near the Los Angeles River. When they reached maturity, they annoyed park-goers, pets and horses from the Sepulveda Basin to Griffith Park to Elysian Park.

The black fly swarms in 1994 were so bad that golfers at the Sepulveda Basin Recreation Center resorted to wearing headdresses or smoking cigars to fend off the flies. Even macho Dodgers players resorted to slathering on Avon’s delicately scented Skin So Soft lotion--which also doubles as insect repellent--to combat the bugs, which like to crawl into nostrils and nibble on ear canals.

The flies have been known to land around eyelids and can spread pinkeye, said Michael Shaw, superintendent of the Greater Los Angeles County Vector Control District, the agency that exterminates mosquitoes, black flies, midge flies and Africanized honeybees, or “killer bees.”

Ferraro’s motion would pay the vector district for both last year’s and this year’s black fly abatement. Last year, the abatement cost about $24,000, but vector control officials predict a $10,000 to $12,000 price tag this year, said Ferraro spokeswoman Gayle Johnson. The abatement motion, which is scheduled to be considered by the full council Tuesday, will be changed to reflect district cost predictions, she added.

Conventional wisdom says that paying for the abatement actually saves the city money it would otherwise lose in greens fees and zoo admissions, Shaw explained.

The Vector Control District eliminates black flies by spraying a naturally occurring bacterium along river and creek beds where the pests breed.

Attacking the worm-like black fly larvae, the nonchemical bacterium--or Bacillus thuringiensis israelensis--affects only black flies and mosquitoes, Shaw said. Within a week or two, the bacterium generally kills more than 80% of the black flies.