
New research on how mosquitoes find humans to bite - dnetesn
https://phys.org/news/2020-02-mosquitoes-humans.html
======
eth0up
I spend much of my time in Florida wetlands, aka swamp. The mosquitoes are
perennially surreal on all but the coolest nights and simply bellicose
throughout the summer. One can bathe in repellant, but must then wear earplugs
to mute the bloodletting frenzy. Imagine exceedingly libidinous and hyper
fecund GMO California raisins with fangs, ...on bathsalts and antigravity.
Then give them 2-stroke weedwackers and encephalitis. Against my better
judgement, I often pray that some rogue scientist will destroy them, earth be
damned.

In the meantime, I use picaridin. Picaridin, in contrast to DEET, does not
destroy plastics, isn't greasy, and is more effective at preventing the
bastards from actually making contact. DEET, is more effective at preventing
bites - but not contact. I prefer to remain less molested while incurring a
few bites rather than function as a mosquito stadium. Other than deet and
picaridin, nothing works. Ultrasound, lights, oils, permethrin, gasses - they
are useless for me. My type comprises a potential gold mine for anyone who
discovers an eco-friendly, dry, more effective solution. Please do!

~~~
mindfulhack
Neem oil works 100% (and is a single-source natural plant oil), but it's a
smelly oil (strong nutty smell) and, being oil, means you have to get all
slicky in order to be effective.

With neem, they may fly around you, but they never land on you. They hate its
smell, and also, the oil's compound kills them / makes them and all other
small insects sterile.

So yeah if you're wearing clothes then they have to be ones you're prepared to
get oil on and then wash it out using hot water and baking soda or whatever.

~~~
ignoramous
Burning neem-tree [0] leaves is in regular practice in most non-urban Indian
neighborhoods, to stave off insects and flies, including mosquitoes. Not sure
how effective it is, though.

I must point out that Wikipedia has a page on neem oil and warns of toxicity
if consumed raw [1].

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azadirachta_indica](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azadirachta_indica)

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neem_oil](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neem_oil)

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dmos62
Do mosquitos have a predator? Are there birds that feed on them for example?

~~~
rbobby
Bats are one.

~~~
dreamcompiler
Bats can carry rabies, but overall mosquitos are a lot more dangerous. I'll
take the bats any day.

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mehrdadn
Veritasium had an episode on the topic:
[https://youtu.be/38gVZgE39K8](https://youtu.be/38gVZgE39K8)

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alok-g
If something hot is placed in the room, mosquitoes should have a preference
for that over the humans. Why would such a simple set up to avoid mosquito
bites would not work (I do not think it does)? Genuinely looking to enhance my
understanding.

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jb775
This is one of those topics where people should really learn from human
history rather than jump to conclusions because they sound good at first
thought:

 _The Four Pests Campaign, was one of the first actions taken in the Great
Leap Forward in China from 1958 to 1962. The four pests to be eliminated were
rats, flies, mosquitoes, and sparrows....[The resulting] ecological imbalance
is credited with exacerbating the Great Chinese Famine, in which 15–45 million
people died of starvation._ [1]

[1]
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Pests_Campaign](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Pests_Campaign)

~~~
vosper
The full quote (and the rest of the article), when including the parts you
omitted, implies that it was the campaign against sparrows, not mosquitos,
that was the main problem:

> The four pests to be eliminated were rats, flies, mosquitoes, and sparrows.
> The extermination of sparrows is also known as Smash Sparrows Campaign
> (Chinese: 打麻雀运动; pinyin: Dǎ Máquè Yùndòng) or Eliminate Sparrows Campaign
> (Chinese: 消灭麻雀运动; pinyin: Xiāomiè Máquè Yùndòng), which resulted in severe
> ecological imbalance, being one of the causes of the Great Chinese Famine.
> In 1960, Mao Zedong ended the campaign against sparrows and redirected the
> fourth focus to bed bugs.

There's no suggestion in the article you referenced that attempting to
eliminate mosquitos had anything to do with the famine.

~~~
carlmr
>There's no suggestion in the article you referenced that attempting to
eliminate mosquitos had anything to do with the famine.

Not directly, but assuming that what humans regard as pests don't have a
function in the ecosystem, so I'd say his point is valid. Mess with the
ecosystem in an extreme way and you might suffer dire consequences.

~~~
jb775
> Mess with the ecosystem in an extreme way and you might suffer dire
> consequences.

This was exactly my main point.

Apparently the elimination of sparrows also led to a dramatic increase in
mosquitos (since sparrows eat mosquitoes), so it had a domino effect of
negative impacts. They didn't have the technology to obliterate mosquitoes at
the time, and that's essentially what we're talking about here...so I'm saying
there will likely be unforeseen consequences if people mess with this. (coming
from a guy who hates mosquitoes - i actually bought mosquito pants last year
bc they are so bad in the summer when I'm doing yard work)

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russfink
So how do we use this information? Personal cooling vests? Or are they
advocating an IR21 genetic inhibitor protocol?

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sudhirj
That’s nice. But how do we kill them all? Whatever happened to that experiment
with using CRISPR to make them sterile?

~~~
zepto
This seems like a phenomenally bad idea.

Many areas of rainforest are only protected against illegal logging operations
because they are dense with malarial mosquitos.

~~~
sudhirj
Protecting the rainforest is fine, but relying on loggers being scared of
mosquitoes isn’t an effective way to do it. What if they find good repellents?
Or start spraying the forest before logging? We can kill the mosquitoes and
work to save the forest, they’re not exclusive.

~~~
zepto
Yes - the mosquitos may one day not be effective in protecting the rainforest.

You are saying we should make that happen as soon as possible.

Killing the mosquitos is not exclusive with working to save the forest only if
you have another way to save the forest.

Nothing has been able to prevent the illegal logging except mosquitoes. What
is your suggestion?

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adaisadais
Mosquito larvae are very important in aquatic ecology (1). While they are
annoying as F they are important to our overall ecosystem.

Bees sting and kill people each year but no one would ever attempt to
sterilize all of the bees. They are different, yes, but each play an important
part on our planet.

(1) [https://www.google.com/amp/s/io9.gizmodo.com/what-if-
every-m...](https://www.google.com/amp/s/io9.gizmodo.com/what-if-every-
mosquito-on-earth-went-extinct-tomorrow-1646840383/amp)

~~~
pnako
You can disrupt ecosystems without ending the world ("life finds a way").

The logic in your linked article is a bit specious; certain species eat
mosquito larvae, so without mosquitoes they won't have food, and the species
eating them won't have food, and so on. But nothing is actually static, there
would be some dynamic adjustment (arguably, hard to predict). Species will
find something else to snack on.

In fact you could argue that those species eating mosquito larvae are
detrimental to mosquitoes! Maybe they're preventing something else from
happening by eating them before they develop.

~~~
ryall
Yeah I'm sure it's totally fine disrupting an entire ecosystem

[http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20170516-when-wolves-
return-t...](http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20170516-when-wolves-return-to-
the-wild-everything-changes)

[https://www.gorgeouscreatures.com.au/blogs/news/the-
history-...](https://www.gorgeouscreatures.com.au/blogs/news/the-history-of-
possums-in-new-zealand)

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gorse_in_New_Zealand](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gorse_in_New_Zealand)

~~~
vosper
I'm a Kiwi, and whether gorse is a problem is a matter of perspective. It's
not causing any harm to almost anyone at all. It's not what's native, so
people don't like it - that's fine, but it's mostly aesthetics at the end of
the day. I love our native plants and birds, but I also think gorse is really
pretty when it's all in flower.

But that's not the point: gorse in NZ is not even slightly comparable to
mosquito-borne illnesses. No-one ever died because of gorse in New Zealand.
According to Unicef malaria kills 1,000,000 people every year. This is
something we might want to disrupt.

~~~
antod
In NZ, gorse is actually a fairly good nursery for native trees/bush that will
eventually shade it out and take over from it. The main problem gorse caused
was taking over grassy farmland.

Pine trees are another matter though, they make it very difficult for native
plants.

