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| navigate: home: magazine: fall 2001: article | |
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Urban entomologist helps keep bugs at bay for 35 years By Karen Wing | |||||||||
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The insects that most people spend a lifetime trying to avoid have been the subjects of a lifetime of work for Dr. Stanley G. Green, associate professor of entomology at Penn State. For 35 years, he has been an urban entomologist with Penn State Cooperative Extension, which means his focus is on household insects like termites, cockroaches, silverfish, lice, moths and bed bugs, as well as public health threats like ticks and mosquitoes. These insects are more than just a nuisance; they carry, at times, life-threatening diseases to both people and animals. “I do a lot of work with vector control,” Green said. “A vector is an animal that transmits a disease. For instance, a mosquito that bites a bird, picks up the disease and then bites a human or horse is a vector. Ticks are vectors of Lyme disease and all kinds of other diseases.” Working out of Penn State Cooperative Extension’s Philadelphia County office, he serves the southeast region of Pennsylvania. In addition to fielding calls from homeowners, physicians, allergists and dermatologists, he is dedicated to helping educate those in (or trying to get into) the pest control industry. In Pennsylvania, that means more than 4,000 pest control operators and public health applicators, and his efforts have had a far-reaching effect. “Stan has for years provided expertise to the southeast part of the state in the area of urban entomology,” Frederick W. Davis, regional director for the Southeast Region of Penn State Cooperative Extension, said. “He has provided an enormous amount of knowledge to agents and clients alike over a long and distinguished career as an extension educator.” “Stan Green is a first-rate educator,” Dr. Theodore R. Alter, associate vice president for outreach, director of Cooperative Extension and associate dean of the College of Agricultural Sciences, said. “By integrating his educational talents with his entomological knowledge and experience, Stan has made an enormously positive impact on the knowledge people have of insect pests in urban areas and how to control these pests. As a consequence, he has contributed significantly to improving the quality of life in Philadelphia and southeast Pennsylvania.” “I get a lot of calls from pest control operators, but I work a lot with the public,” Green said. “In general, at Cooperative Extension, we try to get people to do things for themselves. If they can solve a problem, I tell them how, or if they can’t, I tell them who they should call.” He also teaches classes to new pest control operators and those in need of recertification. “I teach night classes for pest control operators at the Penn State Abington campus. Those classes meet two-and-a-half hours once a week for six to eight weeks,” he said. “I also teach classes on how to identify wood damage and to recognize whether it’s from termites, carpenter ants, bees or other insects. I have a whole garage full of damaged wood,” he added. His classes have gone a long way to improve the quality of general pest control companies and operators in Pennsylvania. “Stan has been the single most effective trainer of professional pest control company personnel in the southeast part of Pennsylvania and beyond, assisting in their training and certification,” Davis said. “His work has gained him the respect of many of these company owners who recently ‘roasted’ him at a gathering to honor his years of service.” As one might expect, in 35 years, Green has seen the industry change. “The safety is well regulated now by the Environmental Protection Agency and the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture,” he said. “Since 1972, all pest control operators, including lawn care and pool maintenance personnel, have needed this certification. “Also, there’s more of a focus on integrated pest management (IPM). Using IPM, if you know what the pest is, you can modify the environment, use nonchemical methods or a combination of techniques to control the pests. Penn State University has a strong program in IPM.” In his long career, he has also been committed to educating the public about Penn State and Cooperative Extension services. “Dr. Green has been a tireless advocate for Penn State and its outreach efforts to the community at large and to the pest control industry specifically,” Davis said. Green earned his Ph.D. from Colorado State University, focusing on mite identification. His current area of research is yellow jackets — not just the occasional yellow jacket stopping by your picnic — but colonies that can number as high as 8,000 in midsummer. He has investigated methods of baiting and spraying that can wipe out a colony of this size. He is an honorary member of the Pennsylvania Pest Management Association and past president of the Pennsylvania Vector Control Association. He has contributed a portion of the Handbook of Pest Control, which is used by the pest control industry nationally. Green is also always encountering new nuisances with new challenges. “We occasionally run into something we haven’t seen before — like lady beetles that were released in the 1920s as a biological control or the western conifer seed bug.” What bugs are next? Who knows, but perhaps if Green finds them first, the average homeowner will never have the chance to know they’re a problem. | ||||||||
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