DALLAS COUNTY (CBSDFW.COM) – After two straight nights of aerial spraying, Dallas County officials gave it a rest Tuesday night.

Dallas Mayor, Mike Rawlings says spraying from the air is working, and even quoted an e-mail from the CDC to support his claim. “The preliminary data from the pre/post spray mosquito trapping suggested that the mosquito population abundance decreased considerably following the operation,” the mayor read aloud to reporters.

A mosquito spray plane waits at Executive Airport in Oak Clff. (Photo by Jay Gormley, CBS 11)

East Dallas resident, Vanessa Van Gilder is not buying it. “I don’t believe that it was the spraying that caused it [the mosquito population] to go down.”

Van Gilder has launched a blog called, Stop The Spray Dallas. “The Mosquitoes were already at the natural end of their cycle. They’re taking credit for something they did not do”, she added.

Van Gilder’s blog includes a petition with more than 2000 signatures calling for an end to all mosquito spraying in the air and on the ground. She says the health risks of spraying are unknown and that prevention is the best defense.

But state and county health officials believe the CDC will ultimately prove them right. Representatives from the CDC will travel to Dallas to analyze the final results starting Thursday.

Mayor Rawlings says the city will hold off on a third round of spraying until the CDC finishes analyzing the data.

Aerial spraying for cities in the far southern part of Dallas County begins Wednesday evening. Those same cities will be sprayed a second time the following night.

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