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Wed 5 Jul, 2006 08:54 am
Air pollution, cramped living in Athens breeding 'super mosquitoes' Tue Jul 4, 12:33 PM ET
ATHENS (AFP) - Cramped housing conditions and air pollution in Athens have given rise to a "super breed" of mosquito that is larger, faster and more adept at locating human prey, a Greek daily has reported.
Athens-based mosquitoes can detect humans at a distance of 25-30 metres (yards) and also distinguish colours, unlike their colour-blind counterparts elsewhere in the country that only smell blood at 15-20 metres, Ta Nea daily reported.
The "super mosquitoes" of the Greek capital also beat their wings up to 500 times a second -- compared to 350 beats for other variations -- and are larger by 0.3 microgrammes on average, the paper said, citing a study conducted by Aristotelio University in the northern city of Salonika.
According to the study, the mosquitoes of Athens have adapted to deal with air pollution and insect repellents, and overpopulation in the Greek capital of over four million has provided them with a healthy food supply.
"Mosquitoes can lay their eggs even inside the trays placed beneath thousands of balcony flowerpots," Athens University professor of zoology Anastassios Legakis told the daily.
And lucky for the world there is a new product to trap and kill mosquitos. It runs on electricity (adding more co2 in the environment) and, get this folks, EMITS co2 to attract mosquitos to it's greedy maw where they will be annihilated. And, no I won't post product info.
My sister and her hubby bought on of these thing for nearly $300.
littlek wrote:And lucky for the world there is a new product to trap and kill mosquitos. It runs on electricity (adding more co2 in the environment) and, get this folks, EMITS co2 to attract mosquitos to it's greedy maw where they will be annihilated. And, no I won't post product info.
My sister and her hubby bought on of these thing for nearly $300.
They've been selling things like this that use propane tanks as the heat/CO2 source. (I suspect they are actually the same thing.) The propane is slowly let out through a catalytic converter, generating CO2, H2O, and heat that mimic a living animal. The mosquitos fly into a net near the the device's output that then catches the bugs, and they die. While I don't have one, I have heard that they are very effective at ridding an area of biting insects.
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