{"id":13848,"date":"2018-10-11T19:28:44","date_gmt":"2018-10-11T19:28:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/?p=13848"},"modified":"2018-10-11T19:28:44","modified_gmt":"2018-10-11T19:28:44","slug":"giant-mosquitoes-flourish-in-floodwaters-that-hurricanes-leave-behind","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/giant-mosquitoes-flourish-in-floodwaters-that-hurricanes-leave-behind\/","title":{"rendered":"Giant mosquitoes flourish in floodwaters that hurricanes leave behind"},"content":{"rendered":"

Michael Reiskind<\/a>, North Carolina State University<\/a><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

After Hurricane Florence, reports started rolling in of \u201cgiant mosquito\u201d sightings \u2013 and bitings \u2013 throughout North Carolina. What\u2019s going on with these mega mosquitoes that can be as big as a quarter?<\/p>\n

As a mosquito biologist<\/a>, I often get asked to identify a mosquito based upon someone\u2019s verbal report of the little buggers. I usually do OK with an educated guess based on descriptions like \u201cIt had striped legs, and was brown\u201d or \u201cIt looked kind of purple.\u201d<\/p>\n

What I have always struggled with is when someone says \u201cIt was little\u201d or \u201cIt was pretty big.\u201d For the most part, size is not a good identifying feature of the common mosquitoes Americans encounter close to home.<\/p>\n

This is because you can grow relatively large mosquitoes or small ones just depending on the conditions where they grow up \u2013 what entomologists call their larval environment<\/a>. If the larval environment has few other competing mosquitoes, or is rich in nutrients, or has a cool temperature, the result is larger adult mosquitoes<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n \"\"<\/a>
\n You\u2019ll see these mosquitoes coming your way.<\/span>
\n Joanna Poe\/Flickr<\/a>, CC BY-SA<\/a><\/span>
\n <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

There are a couple of species of mosquitoes that are truly gigantic, though. If someone says they saw a big mosquito, and I follow up with \u201cbig for a mosquito, or too big to even be a mosquito?\u201d and they say \u201ctoo big to be a mosquito, but it was biting me,\u201d then I know we truly have one of a couple species of \u201cgiant\u201d mosquitoes.<\/p>\n

Under normal circumstances, these giant, biting mosquitoes \u2013 known locally here in North Carolina as \u201cgallinippers\u201d or scientifically as Psorophora ciliata<\/em> or Psorophora howardi<\/em> \u2013 are quite rare. They are two of about 175 species of mosquitoes we have in the United States. Their moment in the spotlight comes after major flooding events<\/a>, like we had with Hurricane Florence. These mosquitoes can be as much as three times larger than their more typical cousins.<\/p>\n

\n \"\"<\/a>
\n Life stages of mosquitoes.<\/span>
\n LadyofHats\/Wikimedia Commons<\/a>, CC BY<\/a><\/span>
\n <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The gallinippers belong to a genus of mosquitoes that specialize in responding to floods. Females produce lots of eggs, which they spread out around areas that might flood, such as wet meadows, floodplain forests or even agricultural land. Those eggs are resistant to desiccation \u2013 that is, they aren\u2019t damaged by dry conditions \u2013 so they can wait around for a flood the following year, forming an \u201cegg bank.\u201d The eggs are fertilized as the female lays them, from sperm she\u2019s stored during mating. In order to get the blood meals necessary to make many eggs, these mosquitoes are aggressive feeders on mammals, and maybe other vertebrates occasionally.<\/p>\n

But evolving to a giant size doesn\u2019t seem necessary to carry out these tasks. Indeed, many other species in this genus are not giants; they\u2019re more typically mosquito-sized. So what separates the gallinipper?<\/p>\n

One possibility is the fact that gallinippers, as larvae, prey on other mosquito larvae. Perhaps their size is an adaptation to consuming other floodwater mosquitoes, allowing them to more easily capture and consume smaller species? The more typical-sized mosquitoes that use floodwaters are not predators. Size may also allow them to produce many more eggs, which can also be an advantage when the floodwaters come. <\/p>\n

Gallinippers have a painful bite that is usually well noticed by human victims, so the large numbers that emerged after Florence<\/a> have received lots of attention.<\/p>\n

While being bitten by a giant mosquito may not seem like a great thing, there are reasons to take heart. First, these mosquitoes likely get just one good blood meal in their lives, limiting their ability to transmit a pathogen. As far as entomologists know, they don\u2019t transmit any pathogens to people. And since, as larvae, these giants eat other mosquitoes, maybe one big bite is worth 10 small ones? Finally, it\u2019s a great post-hurricane brag to announce \u201cI got bit by a giant freakin\u2019 mosquito!\u201d <\/p>\n

Other good news is that the adults likely don\u2019t live more than a couple of weeks, so the great boom of mosquitoes from Florence is winding down. Of course, now it looks like Hurricane Michael may bring about another round of gallinippers. Winter does end the most immediate threat, but all those eggs are still out there, awaiting next year\u2019s floodwaters.\"The<\/p>\n

Michael Reiskind<\/a>, Assistant Professor of Entomology, North Carolina State University<\/a><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

This article is republished from The Conversation<\/a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Michael Reiskind, North Carolina State University After Hurricane Florence, reports started rolling in of \u201cgiant mosquito\u201d sightings \u2013 and bitings \u2013 throughout North Carolina. What\u2019s going on with these mega mosquitoes that can be as big as a quarter? As a mosquito biologist, I often get asked to identify a mosquito based upon someone\u2019s verbal […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":13849,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3410],"tags":[312,5203,3083,3022,5127,4114,5204,602,2197],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13848"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13848"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13848\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13850,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13848\/revisions\/13850"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13849"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13848"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13848"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13848"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}