Photo of an Asian tiger mosquito Aedes albopictus biting. The most effective way to prevent contact with Asian tiger mosquitoes is to eliminate areas of standing water around the home, such as baby pools, flowerpots and birdbaths. Homeowners should also screen all windows and doors and keep gutters free flowing. Those who spend time outdoors should consider wearing long pants and sleeves, and use an insect repellent containing an EPA-registered ingredient like DEET, picaridin or oil of lemon-eucalyptus.
Watch: How to Apply Insect Repellent. If an Asian tiger mosquito infestation is suspected, a licensed pest control professional should be called to assess the problem and recommend a treatment method.
Watch this video to learn the proper way to apply insect repellant to keep mosquitoes, ticks and other pests away. It's important to wear bug spray when spending time outdoors to prevent mosquito bites.
Female Asian tiger mosquitoes typically bite during the daytime. Asian tiger mosquito bites are not necessarily painful, but they can leave an itchy, red bump on the skin. Male Asian tiger mosquitoes do not bite and primarily feed on plant nectar. Asian tiger mosquitoes are unique in that they typically feed during the daylight hours, unlike many other mosquito species that feed only at dusk and dawn.
In warm regions, Asian tiger mosquitoes are active year-round. However, they are known to overwinter in temperate climates. Like other mosquito species, only females require a blood meal to produce eggs.
The females lay their eggs inside items that can hold at least a half inch of stagnant water, such as tires, flowerpots, birdbaths and clogged drains. That means something as small as a bottle cap can hold enough water for larvae the immature form of insects to develop! Breeding sites are likely to be close to where the adult mosquito can be found.
The females lay their eggs inside items that can hold stagnant water, such as tires, flowerpots, birdbaths and clogged drains. Furthermore, we are involved in several research projects related to the tiger mosquito and at any given time, we employ several PhD students who deal with different aspects of this topic and publish their data in international journals. The Vector Control group at Swiss TPH includes people with various expertise allowing us to cover many aspect related to the tiger mosquito problem.
The focus of the project group is on supporting public institutions with competent scientific and technical information. TIGER is instrumental in ensuring that access to important data related to alien mosquitoes and risk assessment is always available.
The tiger mosquito has been monitored in Switzerland since at national level. At the beginning of each summer, traps are set up and monitored along the motorways and in various places with a high potential for introduction, such as ports, airports and railway stations. Swiss TPH has been involved in this project from the beginning - we helped to define the trap network and are responsible for setting up and controlling the traps in the whole of Northeastern and Western Switzerland.
The latest report of the national tiger mosquito surveillance programme is available here in German only. The Swiss TPH team supports several cantons in monitoring and controlling the tiger mosquito. Trap locations are identified, monitoring networks installed and regular inspection visits carried out. The data are then processed at regular intervals and sent to the cantonal authorities so that measures can be taken as quickly as possible.
Our team is constantly working to make the collection, combination and evaluation of data even more effective and to review the latest strategies for controlling alien mosquitoes and adapt them to Switzerland. So-called mark-release recapture experiments are used to determine the population density of mosquitoes, their distribution patterns, flight distance and lifespan.
These factors are important for estimating the disease transmission potential of tiger mosquitoes in a given area and for taking appropriate measures.
For this purpose, mosquitoes are marked with a dye and released. A trap network is established to catch as many of these mosquitoes as possible. Based on the generated data, conclusions can be drawn about movement patterns and mosquito density.
Population genetics is the branch of genetics that deals, not with an individual, but with the genetic processes within a population. The transmission of genetic information from one generation to the next plays a central role in this.
Population genetics determines the relative frequency of certain genes within a population and investigates their alteration under the influence of mutations, selections, random genetic drifts, the separation of subpopulations and the gene flow between different populations. Population genetics helps us to better understand where the various tiger mosquito populations in Switzerland originally come from and how they spread within the country.
It can also tell us whether a local population is already established and hibernates, or whether it is introduced each year. Such findings are important to elucidate the distribution patterns of the Asian tiger mosquito and to take effective measures against the further spread of this invasive species. He is a medical entomologist working on the biology of disease vectors, insecticide resistance, insect monitoring and the development of new strategies and products for effective disease vector control.
Currently, his work focused on the development of new methods for monitoring and control, and the biology of invasive mosquitoes in Europe. His main activity is the monitoring of the tiger mosquito in Switzerland. This includes the concrete planning and implementation of cantonal and national monitoring, the cooperation with the different authorities, other institutes, universities and the population of the affected areas, the determination of the mosquitoes and eggs with morphological and mass spectrometric methods and the co-development of new determination methods.
In addition, he identifies the mosquitoes reported by the population, searches for mosquito larvae with his team and supports and advises the cantonal authorities in raising public awareness and combating the tiger mosquito. Other activities include testing insecticides and repellents against mosquitoes at the mosquito test centre and developing new test methods.
Within his PhD thesis, he worked on the distribution, biology and surveillance of the Asian tiger mosquito near the Swiss-Italian border and helped to establish a national surveillance network for invasive mosquitoes in Switzerland.
Tobias Suter has extensive experience in monitoring mosquitoes in the field and conducting experiments to identify resistance to insecticides. At the Swiss TPH, he is also responsible for the mosquito testing centre, where insecticide products, repellents and other methods of mosquito repellence are tested. Surveillance of invasive Aedes mosquitoes along Swiss traffic axes reveals different dispersal modes for Aedes albopictus and Ae. DOI: Wipf N.
Evaluation of honey-baited FTA cards in combination with different mosquito traps in an area of low arbovirus prevalence. Parasit Vectors. Roiz D et al. Integrated Aedes management for the control of Aedes -borne diseases. Suter T et al. Insecticide susceptibility of Aedes albopictus and Ae. Spread and establishment of Aedes albopictus in southern Switzerland between and an analysis of oviposition data and weather conditions. Therefore, it might not pose as great a threat for SLE transmission in California as do Culex mosquitoes.
SLE is a viral disease which is often very serious in young children and the elderly, attacking the central nervous system and occasionally causing death. Yellow fever is an extremely serious disease that is not established in the U. Although the Asian tiger mosquito is a competent laboratory vector of several viral pathogens, there is no evidence to date that this mosquito has caused human disease in the U.
Distribution: The Asian tiger mosquito is native to Southeast Asia and has been spread along major transportation routes by human activities, particularly commercial movement of scrap tires, to more than counties in 26 states in the continental USA as well as Hawaii. Aedes albopictus was found again in California in and sporadically thereafter through Although introductions to ports and nurseries have been controlled, this species continues to pose a threat to public health in California.
Introduction of this species in standing water, enclosed containers where pools of water are present, or by desiccation-resistant eggs associated with previous pools of standing water are likely mechanisms of invasion by this species. Research: There is no ongoing research on this species in California. Research programs carried out by the CDC and in several southeastern states are focusing on documenting the distribution of the Asian tiger mosquito, studying the competitive interactions between Aedes albopictus and closely related species in the same genus, examining the disease incidence in specimens collected in nature, and carrying out laboratory vector competence studies.
Cooperation between federal agencies and universities has greatly aided understanding of the distribution and ecology of this mosquito. Photos courtesy of Susan Ellis Bugwood. William Walton , Professor of Entomology william. Invasive Species Asian Tiger Mosquito.
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