The Marsh

By Andrew

It’s the summer. Most summers I go to my grandparent’s house with my dad. They have a trailer in a place called Pefferlaw on Lake Simcoe. My favorite place to go is this marsh that I like to call Old Muddy. It has all these neat trails and frogs that are fun to try to catch. There are these paths that wind all the way around the marsh and it is interesting what you find on it when hiking.

That swamp is now closed. It is closed because there is a mosquito infestation there and if you go you could get West Nile Virus from the bite of a mosquito. There are so many mosquitoes because the bugs usually die during the winter and then more are born during the summer. Now suddenly with the climate change the mosquitoes aren’t dying during the winter. The ones from the summer stay alive then there are also the ones from next year, so now there’s twice as many. If this keeps up there will be four times the amount and there will continue to be more bugs and the bugs will carry West Nile Virus. There are still some bugs that are good, such as black flies. They help to make blueberries and bees help to make honey, but then there are bad ones like mosquitoes. They just give people viruses and make people very uncomfortable.

So I started to think about what I could do to help the environment and I thought about what I could on my own. So I got my family to start doing more things like using energy efficient light bulbs and during the winter we use the heater less and during the summer we use the air conditioner less. So if you’re still one of those people who thinks what can I do just as one person, tell others about your ideas and if you told two people then they told two people and if all them told two people then right there you would have twelve people all trying to help the environment.

I went back again the next summer and it was even worse, there were no frogs or other animals and there were tons of mosquitoes. So now my favorite place at my grandparents trailer is closed. So if you care about your friends and family then help the environment, if you don’t have a compost bin get one, if you have regular light bulbs, get energy efficient light bulbs and do it now before its to late.

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