WILDWOOD CREST — A summer visitor of Wildwood Crest and 13-year Girl Scout is helping the borough reduce its greenhead fly population.
Jessica Ridge, a Hamilton Square resident who visits the Crest each summer with her family, has built and donated eight greenhead fly trap boxes that have been placed at various places throughout the borough as part of her Gold Award project for the Girl Scouts.
Ridge, 17, about to enter her senior year at Steinert High School, said she came up with the idea for the boxes while vacationing a few years ago in Cape Cod, where more than 400 such boxes have been placed to help control the greenhead fly population.
Ridge said flies enter the boxes from the bottom and become trapped. The flies then disintegrate and fall through the screen, making the boxes completely self-cleaning.
With the help of and supervision by the Wildwood Crest Department of Public Works, Ridge placed six boxes in the beach dunes at various street ends along the Wildwood Crest bike path from Cresse Avenue through Rambler Road. Two additional boxes were placed behind the public works yard on Newark Avenue.
“We were very happy to accommodate and assist Jessica with this worthwhile project,” said Don Cabrera, Wildwood Crest Commissioner of Public Works. “We are extremely pleased that Jessica asked to bring her project to Wildwood Crest and we are confident these trap boxes will lessen the amount of greenhead flies in the borough. We all know these flies can be a great nuisance, particularly in the warm summer months.”
The trap boxes will be taken down and stored at the end of each summer by the Wildwood Crest Department of Public Works. The boxes will be mounted again prior to the following summer.
Ridge said her Gold Award project required a minimum of 80 hours of work. She said she surpassed 100 hours by the time her work was complete.
“I am very proud of the hard work that went into building these boxes,” Ridge said. “I learned how to use many tools along the way.”
For more information about the greenhead fly trap boxes, contact the Wildwood Crest Department of Public Works at (609) 522-7446.
