Why dengue, not West Nile, drives the conversation in Miami
Most of the country plans mosquito control around West Nile virus. South Florida is the exception, and the state's own data shows why. Florida's 2025 West Nile activity was concentrated in the north: 6 symptomatic human cases, in Clay, Duval, and Escambia counties, plus 398 positive sentinel chickens across 29 counties. Statewide, Florida recorded 15 neuroinvasive West Nile cases in 2024, an incidence of 0.06 per 100,000, which is among the lowest rates in the country. Dengue is the local story instead. Florida counted 62 locally acquired dengue cases in 2025, with transmission concentrated in Brevard and Miami-Dade, and 417 travel associated cases statewide including 261 in Miami-Dade. The practical difference is which mosquito you are fighting and where its water is. West Nile control means larvicide in drains, ponds, and neglected pools. Dengue control means containers within a few hundred yards of where people are being bitten, which is to say your yard, your building's courtyard, and your neighbors' patios.
The bottle cap rule and what it means for a Miami yard
Aedes aegypti can complete its development in a startlingly small amount of water. A saucer, a bromeliad cup, a bottle cap sized depression in a tarp, the tray under a potted palm. That changes what a property inspection has to look like. Instead of scanning for standing water, you are looking for anything concave, and there is more of it than anyone expects. Start close to the house, since these mosquitoes stay near buildings. The drip trays under potted plants, the base of an umbrella stand, a folded pool cover, a boot left outside, a plant hanger cup, the rim of a trash bin lid, the pool skimmer. Then the planting. Bromeliads hold water in their leaf cups as part of how they live, so they need flushing weekly with a hose rather than removal. Then the drainage: courtyard drains, planter wells, downspout outlets, and any low spot that stays wet after the afternoon rain. Every item on that list refills during the wet season, which is why once a week is the interval that actually works here rather than an ambitious target.
Living without an off season
Almost every mosquito guide written for the United States assumes a winter that ends the season. South Florida does not have one, and planning as if it does is the most common local mistake. With winter lows averaging 60F, adult mosquitoes survive comfortably and container eggs never face a killing freeze. Florida's surveillance recorded locally acquired dengue onsets from February through November in 2025, which is essentially the whole year. The implication for a homeowner is that the weekly routine is permanent rather than seasonal. There is no spring cleanup that resets things, because nothing was ever reset. It also means service contracts should be read differently. A summer package that covers June through September is a partial answer in a place where February is a transmission month. The good news is that the work itself does not get harder in the cooler months, because the wet season eases and containers refill less often. A fifteen minute pass in January is easier than the same pass in July, and skipping it is how populations carry over.
How imported infections turn into local transmission
The link between travel and neighborhood mosquito control is not obvious, so it is worth spelling out. A person picks up dengue abroad and comes home while still infectious. Local Aedes aegypti bite that person, become infected themselves, and pass the virus to other people nearby. Because these mosquitoes travel only a few blocks, the chain stays tight and geographically small. Florida's 2025 numbers show both halves of that picture: 417 travel associated dengue cases statewide, with 261 in Miami-Dade, alongside the 62 locally acquired cases. Chikungunya followed the same route, with 277 imported cases in 2025 and 265 of those originating in Cuba. What follows practically is modest. When someone in the household returns from an area with dengue transmission, keep repellent and screens tight for a couple of weeks, both to protect them and to keep local mosquitoes from picking anything up. And keep the containers empty, since the fewer mosquitoes are hatching within a block of the house, the fewer opportunities exist for a chain to start.
What should a first visit include?
On a South Florida property, the first appointment should be a container audit rather than a demonstration of equipment. Expect the provider to work close to the house first, since that is where the daytime biter lives, and to open and inspect things rather than looking at them from a distance: saucers, trays, the pool skimmer, the umbrella base, bromeliad cups. They should ask when you get bitten. Daylight biting points squarely at containers. Dusk biting points at larger, dirtier water and possibly a source off the property. They should check the drainage after rain, and look at courtyards, alleys, and any shared space if the building has one. They should also tell you what belongs to the county program rather than to them. What you want in writing: which containers get treated, whether egg laying traps are included and how often they are serviced, which water gets larvicide, where residual is applied, how many visits across a full year rather than a summer, and what falls outside the scope.
Condos, courtyards, and shared responsibility
Dense housing splits this problem across owners, tenants, and associations, and the mosquitoes live in the gaps. Fixtures belong to the owner or association: irrigation, drainage, courtyard drains, fountains, pools, planter wells, and gutters. Containers on a balcony or patio belong to whoever brought them out. The difficult category is the shared space that nobody inspects. A planter well in a courtyard, a drain behind a trash enclosure, the strip between two buildings, a decorative basin nobody maintains. Any of those can supply a whole building, and because the daytime biter travels only a few blocks, every unit facing that space feels it. If you rent, do your own containers first, then send the shared items in writing with photos. Complaints from several units at once tend to move faster than one. If you manage a building, put a weekly container check of the shared areas on someone's list. In a climate where breeding never pauses, that single recurring task will do more than any spraying contract.