A Fisherman Getting His Feet Wet In Fosdick Lake With Bright Orange Wildflowers

Apparently it was a good day to go fishing on Fosdick Lake today, even though eating a fish one caught in Fosdick Lake might turn out to be a fatal mistake.

There were several fishermen and fisherwomen fishing in Fosdick Lake today.

The fisherman you see in the picture had his seat sitting in the water, with his feet submerged in the toxic Fosdick brew.

I figure if there are warning signs telling people not to eat the Fosdick fish, not to swim in the Fosdick water and to not even launch a boat in the toxic Fosdick brew, that dipping ones feet in the water might not be a good idea.

I wonder if Fosdick Lake is one of Fort Worth's West Nile Virus mosquito breeding grounds slated for spraying? It seems that that would add even more toxicity to the already toxic Fosdick brew.

Even though we are having ourselves a Mosquito Crisis in North Texas, I have yet to see my first Texas mosquito, let alone get bit by one.

Maybe the unseasonably, unreasonably chilly temperatures will put a damper on the rampant North Texas mosquito breeding.

It was barely in the 80s when I drove to Oakland Lake Park, at noon, to walk around Fosdick Lake. Now, hours later my computer based temperature monitoring device is telling me it is only 89 degrees in the outer world at my location.

Are we done with 100 degree days for the year? I hope so.

Even though the prime time of the Texas wildflower season is long past, there is still some color coloring up the outdoors in Texas, like the bright orange flower I stared at today located near the south end of Fosdick Lake.

Hiking The Dry Trails Of The Tandy Hills While Being Alert About The Air Quality

Even though up to 4 inches of rain fell in some locations in the D/FW zone on Saturday, I decided, since my computer based temperature monitoring device was telling me that it was only 79 degrees in the outer world at my location at a half hour before noon, that I'd risk running into rampaging creeks and getting stuck in mud by returning for some salubrious endorphin inducing aerobic stimulation via hiking up and down a few of the Tandy Hills.

Well.

The trails were pretty much bone dry, with just some slight hints that a little rain may have hit the prairie in recent days. No water was running in Tandy Creek. Tandy Falls remains bone dry.

As you can see, via the look west at the stunning skyline of beautiful downtown Fort Worth, the air appears to be smog-free, scrubbed by the recent storms.

However, despite appearing to be clear air, the National Weather Service, or whoever it is who determines such things, has determined that we need to have an AIR QUALITY ALERT.

Maybe this AIR QUALITY ALERT has something to do with the toxins being sprayed throughout the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex, attempting to kill West Nile Virus bearing mosquitoes before they make more people sick. Or dead.

West Nile Virus Has Reached Epidemic Level In North Texas

I was aware that for several years now the West Nile Virus has been being delivered by the Culex species of mosquitoes to humans all over America.

I had no idea til this morning that the number of incidents of West Nile Virus cases in North Texas has now reached an epidemic level.

Dallas recorded the first West Nile Virus death of the year, in America, within the past week.

West Nile Virus comes in varying levels of seriousness, with the most serious being the neuro-invasive virus version, which attacks the body's nervous system.

When I was reading about this mosquito caused epidemic I thought to myself that I do not recollect having a single mosquito bite all my years in Texas.

So,  what do I see on my face upon my return from the pool this morning? Well, it looks like a mosquito bite.

I do not remember a spring, summer or fall, in Washington, where I did not get mosquito bites.

I remember my first year in Texas, being in a Home Depot, in March, appalled at an invasion of what we called waterbugs. These round bugs that were attracted to light and sort of killed themselves ramming into the light, leaving a pile of waterbug corpses on the ground.

The lady at Home Depot told me the bug situation gets much worse as we get closer to summer.

I was mortified. Thinking the Texas bug invasion was going to be much worse than the annual insect invasion in Washington.

Well, I was relieved that, except for a plague of locusts, the insects in Texas are not as annoying as those in Washington. Except for cockroaches. I never saw a cockroach til I moved to Texas. But, I find cockroaches to be the most entertaining insect I have ever met. And they don't bite.

In Washington, in the Puget Sound lowlands, you would get plagued by annoying horse flies, in addition to mosquitoes and other flying biters.

Til the first freeze of the coming winter you can not go hiking in the Cascade High Country without covering yourself with bug spray, lest you find yourself covered with biting deer flies, whose bite hurts real bad.

I just checked the insect bite I got on my face in the pool this morning. It seems to have faded. I don't think it was a mosquito bite from a West Nile Virus Culex species of mosquito.

The majority of people who get bit by a West Nile Virus carrying mosquito develop no symptoms. People over 50, with weak immune systems, and people like Gar the Texan, who are prone to attacks of the vapors, are at risk of developing the disease.