10 Interesting Mosquito Facts and Pictures

Animal Wildlife | Interesting Mosquito Facts and Pictures | Mosquitoes are insects belonging to the order Diptera; genera Anopheles, Culex, Psorophora, Ochlerotatus, Aedes, Sabethes, Wyeomyia, Culiseta, and Haemagoggus for a total of about 35 genera, consisting 2700 species. Mosquitoes have two scaly wings, slender body, and six long feet; vary among species but rarely exceed 15 mm.

Mosquito Facts and Pictures

The word mosquito is derived from Spanish or Portuguese, which means small flies. The word Mosquito began to use in 1583. In the United Kingdom mosquito known as Gnats.

On female mosquitoes, the mouth to form a long proboscis to pierce the skin of mammals. Female mosquitoes need protein for egg formation and because mosquito diet consists only of honey and fruit juices, which do not contain protein, most female mosquitoes need blood sucking to get essential protein. Male mosquitoes differ from the females. Male mosquitoes has mouth that is not suitable for sucking blood. While female mosquitoes of the genus Toxorhynchites never sucking blood. The big larvae of this mosquito is a predator of other mosquito larva.

Mosquitoes have four stages in their life cycle: egg, larva, pupa, and adult. The duration of the first three stages depending on the species - and the temperature. Only female mosquitoes are sucking blood of its prey, and it has no correlation with eating. Because, in fact, both male and female mosquitoes eat nectar liquids. The female mosquitoes suck blood to nourish their eggs. Mosquito eggs need protein from the blood to develop.

Most of mosquito can spread protozoan diseases such as malaria, filarial disease such as elephantiasis, and viral diseases such as yellow and dengue fever, encephalitis, and West Nile virus. West Nile virus is spread by accident to the United States in 1999 and in 2003 had spread to all states of the United States.

Mosquito Facts and Pictures

Mosquitoes can find a target precisely by identifying movement, odor and temperature of the target. When a mosquito landed on the body it put its straw-like mouth called proboscis. There is a knife-like part that used for dissecting the skin to find vein and then sucking the blood. During the process the mosquito also releases saliva contains anticoagulant to prevent the blood to coagulate.

The process is very fast and as if mosquito only do injection on the body but it was not.. The mosquito dissects the skin like a surgeon who work quickly and accurately.

After mosquito fed, it would pull proboscis out and fly. The saliva left on the skin will stimulate the body to respond strange objects. There is a process known as allergy, followed by the onset of itching and bumps.