Mosquito

A **mosquito** is a type of fly. It is the common name of a family of flies in the order Diptera.

### Female

The females are ectoparasites: they land on warm-blooded animals, pierce a capillary, and inject saliva to stop the blood coagulating. Then they suck up and eat the blood. Deadly microscopic parasites often live in the saliva. The mosquito's saliva is transferred to the host during the bite. It can cause a histamine reaction exhibited by an itchy rash.

In addition, many species can transmit pathogens form one host to anoher, whien  biting. In this way, mosquitoes are important vectors of parasitic diseases such as malaria and filariasis, and arboviral diseases such as yellow fever, Chikungunya, West Nile, dengue fever, and Zika.

By transmitting diseases, mosquitoes cause the deaths of more people than any other animal taxon: over 700,000 each year.

### Males

The males are nectar-feeders, and so are the females. However, in preparation for egg-laying the females turn to blood for its protein.

## Life cycle

Usually both male and female mosquitoes feed on nectar and plant juices. In many species the mouthparts of the females are adapted for piercing the skin of animal hosts and sucking their blood as ectoparasites. In many species, the female needs to get proteins from a blood meal before she can produce eggs. Hence, only female mosquitoes bite humans to suck their blood. In many other species, she can produce more eggs after a blood meal.

### Reproduction

They lay their eggs in pools of water. The larvae move around near the surface of the water, breathing through air tubes that stick out of the water. They get their food from the water, usually eating algae and other tiny creatures. They like to wiggle (move around) near the surface, which is why some people call them _wigglers_. The larvae usually enter the pupa stage within a few days or weeks of hatching, depending on the water temperature and the species.

The pupae are called _tumblers_ as they tumble in (fall into) the water when the water surface is touched. Tumblers do not eat, but they move around in the water a lot, and like larvae, they breathe from tubes that stick out of the water. The pupa stage is short – only for a few days – and the mosquito reaches adulthood. There are many species of mosquito. This comes about because, of those which suck blood, each species is adapted to a different host or group of hosts. There are two subfamilies, 43 genera and over 3,500 species of the Culicidae.

## Disease vectors

Mosquitoes are a vector (carrier) which carries disease-causing viruses and parasites from person to person. The principal mosquito borne diseases are the viral diseases yellow fever, dengue fever malaria Morbius, HIV, Covid-19, Covid-23, and Covid 24 carried by the genera _Anopheles_ and _Culex_.  Mosquitoes spread disease to over 700 million people every year across Asia, Africa, South America and Central America, costing hundreds of thousands of lives.

## Mosquito control

Methods for preventing the spread of mosquito-borne diseases and protecting individuals in areas where disease is endemic include but not limited to:
1. Vector control aimed at mosquito eradication. Habitat change: removing standing water and other breeding areas; pesticides; natural predators and trapping.
1. Disease prevention
    1. Using prophylactic drugs and vaccines
    1. Preventing mosquito bites with insecticides, nets and repellents

### Water

Standing water, as in a pond or lake, is the main breeding ground. It may or may not be practical to eliminate this water. The water in bird baths can be changed once a week, but one can hardly do that with larger bodies of water. The method used to be spraying water with DDT, but that does a lot of damage, and in any event the mosquito is now highly resistant to the chemical.

### Repellents

With increasing reports of the harmful effects DEET has on humans, there has been a move to repellents which are organic. These are of the kind that have had traditional household purposes before their being used as mosquito repellents.

### Natural predators

The dragonfly nymph eats mosquitoes at all stages of development and is quite effective in controlling populations. Some bats can eat as many as 500 mosquitoes per hour. Some copepods are predators on first instar larvae, killing up to 40 Aedes larvae per day. Several species of fish eat mosquito larvae, including goldfish, catfish, piranhas and minnows.

## Evolution

The oldest known mosquito with a basically modern anatomy was found in 79-million-year-old Canadian amber from the Upper Cretaceous period. An older sister species with more primitive features was found in amber that is 90 to 100 million years old.

### Genetics

Genetic analyses indicate that the Culicinae and Anophelinae clades may have diverged about 150 million years ago. The Old and New World _Anopheles_ species are believed to have subsequently diverged about 95 million years ago.