INTRODUCTION TO MOSQUITOES

Introduction to Mosquitoes

        It is interesting to know about mosquitoes. Mosquitoes includes about 3,500 species that are flies. The word mosquito is arise from 'mosca' word. 'Mosquito' is the spanish word for "little flies".

Mosquitoes have slender segmented body, having a pair of wings, one pair of halteres, three pairs of long hair like legs and elongated mouthparts.

        The life cycle of mosquitoes include four stages which are egg, larva, pupa and adult. The eggs of mosquitoes are laid on water surface which are then hatch and the larvae comes out which then feed on the aquatic algae or the organic materials. The adult females of most species having tude like elongated mouthparts which helps them two pierce into skin of host to feed on blood, which contains proteins and iron needed  to produce eggs. Thousands of species of mosquitoes feed on blood of various - vertebrates, including mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, and some fish; along with some invertebrates, primarily other arthropods. this loss of blood is seldom(rarely) of any importance  to the host.

        When the mosquitoes bite to the host skin the saliva of mosquitoes enters into the host skin and that's why can cause the itchy rash. In addition, many species can ingest pathogens while biting, they can also transmit them into future host. That's why we can say that mosquitoes are important vectors of diseases such that malaria, yellow fever, Chikungunya, West Nile, dengue fever, filariasis, Zika and other arboviruses. By transmitting diseases, mosquitoes can cause the deaths of more people then any other animal taxon: over 700,000 each year and almost half of the people who have ever lived.

Scientific Classification

Kingdom = Animalia

Phylum = Arthropoda

Order = Diptera

Superfamily = Culicoidea

Family = Culicidea