Photo by: Nicoleta Ionescu/Shutterstock

There are a lot of positives to camping and spending the night outdoors. Bugs are not one of them, but they are a constant companion for campers, particularly in warmer weather. As a result, people often take steps to repel bugs from campsites. However, even the best efforts to keep bugs out of your tent while camping aren’t always 100% effective. But there’s one trick you might not have tried that helps avoid sharing your sleeping quarters with flies, mosquitoes, gnats, and other pesky insects…….Continue reading…

By : Danno Wise

Source: OutDoorGuide

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Critics:

Many measures have been tried for mosquito control, including the elimination of breeding places, exclusion via window screens and mosquito nets, biological control with parasites such as fungi and nematodes, or predators such as fish, copepods, nymphs and adults, and some species of lizard and gecko.

Another approach is to introduce large numbers of sterile males.Genetic modification methods including cytoplasmic incompatibility, chromosomal translocations, sex distortion and gene replacement, solutions seen as inexpensive and not subject to vector resistance, have been explored.

Control of disease-carrying mosquitoes using gene drives has been proposed. Mosquito bites lead to a variety of skin reactions and more seriously to mosquito bite allergies. Such hypersensitivity to mosquito bites is an excessive reaction to mosquito saliva proteins. Numerous species of mosquito can trigger such reactions, including Aedes aegypti, A. vexans, A. albopictus, Anopheles sinensis, Culex pipiens, Aedes communis, Anopheles stephensi, C. quinquefasciatus, C. tritaeniorhynchus, and Ochlerotatus triseriatus.

Cross-reactivity between salivary proteins of different mosquitoes implies that allergic responses may be caused by virtually any mosquito species. Treatment can be with anti-itch medications, including some taken orally, such as diphenhydramine, or applied to the skin like antihistamines or corticosteroids such as hydrocortisone. Aqueous ammonia (3.6%) also provides relief. Both topical heat and cold may be useful as treatments.

Mosquitoes are vectors for many disease-causing microorganisms including bacteria, viruses, and protozoan parasites. Nearly 700 million people acquire a mosquito-borne illness each year, resulting in over one million deaths. Common mosquito-borne viral diseases include yellow fever, chikungunya and dengue fever, all transmitted mostly by Aedes aegypti.

Parasitic diseases transmitted by mosquitoes include malaria and lymphatic filariasis. The Plasmodium parasites that cause malaria are carried by female Anopheles mosquitoes. Lymphatic filariasis, the main cause of elephantiasis, is spread by a wide variety of mosquitoes. A bacterial disease spread by Culex and Culiseta mosquitoes is tularemia.

Contra Costa’s new mosquito control strategy combats the pests by releasing more of them  20:34 Tue, 07 Jul