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The Secret Lives of Mosquitoes

smithsonianmag.com

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Re: The Secret Lives of Mosquitoes

#71

Post by kleer001 »

moralestapia wrote: post #65
kleer001 wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Per year and all-time are different stats

??? You seem to imply that Malaria has killed more humans throughout history than heart disease. Laughably, you do not show any source to back up your statement ¯\_(ツ)_/¯. I disagree based on extremely easy to obtain numbers from sources like [1]. Malaria at 200k/year is not even close to Ischaemic heart disease at at about 9M/year. That is an almost 50-fold difference (!). Given that we have experienced an exponenti…

ah, I see the confusion. Heart disease may have killed more, cancer too, but neither of those are animals. The stat easily stands at mosquitoes being the number one deadliest animal to humans of all time.

https://www.realclearscience.com/quick_and_clear_science/201...

Re: The Secret Lives of Mosquitoes

#72

Post by higherup »

_cs2017_ wrote: post #41

How is the beauty of the insect or the way it cares about its eggs relevant to whether or not it should be eradicated? > Must we also evict the magnificently iridescent mosquitoes whose larvae prey on dangerous species, or the ones that pollinate flowers at night, or the single species known to risk its life to protect its eggs from harm?

The author seem to not cite "beauty", but them being not harmful to human beings as a reason not to eradicate them.

Re: The Secret Lives of Mosquitoes

#73

Post by Foobar8568 »

yourapostasy wrote: post #69
Foobar8568 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Deet? Tiger mosquitoes in my home region don't care about it, I sprayed heavily my shoes and legs with Deet based repellent and within 5min, I had these fuckers trying to bite through my shoes! And I could see them feeding on mint flowers as well.

Try 3M Ultrathon. Or go 100% DEET if you haven't tried it already. I'll take the inevitable "oops, DEET causes horrible cancer" news report in the future for clouds of Asian Tiger mosquitoes surrounding but not landing on me, please.

It was already 30%, so similar to the 3M one... http://www.srf.ch/content/download/10055635/115349210/versio... first one in this comparison.

Re: The Secret Lives of Mosquitoes

#75

Post by graderjs »

corty wrote: post #68
graderjs wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No I think the difference is that they directly integrate with humans so much. Particularly with the human immune system, pathogen vectors and genetics. Because they suck our blood. It's a pretty unique parasitic relationship--and often the fate of species, both animal and plant, can turn on their parasitic relationships. Perhaps we are not paying the humble mosquito the dues we naturally owe it? If we press that lev…

There is a tried and proven modern way to do what you claim moskitos are important for: vaccinations.

Mm, I agree there's overlap. But not total. Vaccines are effective tools, but we can't replicate the natural ecosystem and exposure to it, not yet anyway. I agree that vaccines are the closest tech we have to doing this...but they won't replace mozzies.

If we get rid of mozzies we will then need to adopt responsibility for the role the mosquito played, and we might not be able to do that, and even if we can our solutions might cause other problems. It's sort of like saying, "fertilizer can replicate the role of funghi for plants, because fertilizer brings nutrients to plants". So if we decided to get rid of all funghi from the soil (crazy plan), we can just replace it with fertilizer. Problem solved. But not really...This is a metaphor (about the risk and difficulty of replicating a natural system we decide to remove from the ecosystem) not meant to be facsimile.

Look it probably doesn't matter if they only kill aegypti (but it might, it still might be a disaster). I just think it's dangerous to play with that kind of stuff. Let's remove the pathogen, not the vector.

Re: The Secret Lives of Mosquitoes

#76

Post by krasi0 »

b112 wrote: post #22
graderjs wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But why stop there, if it is even possible to? Hundreds or thousands of species of mosquito, can you genetically target a single one for eradication? And if successful, it's easy to imagine the nuances of different species getting lost in government policies. Compounded by the fact that, maybe aegypti and malaria mosquitos represent an equilibrium that, if disturbed by their genocide...would leave a pathogen-vector v…

Well thought out, informative. But still, Kill them all. Noseeums too. I literally cannot be outside my house 3 months of the year unless coated in deet, or head to toe netting. I mean literal clouds of them, and the noseeums in my ears, eyes, death. Death to them all. If all of humanity expires for their lack, I care not, if we take them with us. Death to them all.

In some parts of the world, the suffering that you describe already lasts 9+ months of the year. Mosquito swarms literally eat you alive while outside.

Re: The Secret Lives of Mosquitoes

#77

Post by krasi0 »

zionic wrote: post #62
codingdave wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Add some birdfeeders around your house, and if swallows start to build their nests on your home, let them. I live next to wetlands, but the birds eat the bugs. Swallows specifically eat over 10,000 mosquitoes a day, so if you get them established on your property, it makes a huge difference.

While these kind of suggestions are no doubt intended to be helpful, they come off as ignorant to anyone who has lived in a mosquito-prone area. Short of living in an actual bat cave, you’ll never get the density of predators required to solve the mosquito problem.

Of all the natural predators mentioned above, only dragonflies make a real difference. It's night and day in the same area depending on whether there's a healthy population of dragonflies nearby.
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