Mosquitoes and How They Work
Mosquitoes are annoying but here’s how they work!
You slap your arm after you feel a slight stinging sensation. You check, and you have your own blood and a mosquito’s flattened body on your hand. But do you know how mosquitoes work?
The mosquito is an insect that sucks blood for food. Its name is derived from mosca and ito, meaning “little fly” in Portuguese and Spanish. Mosquitoes are very irritating. But how do they really slurp up your blood? The mosquito begins by finding food, which is your blood. Once it’s on you, it spits a liquid that numbs the pain so you won’t feel the bite. The mosquito has a little part at the end of its mouth called a proboscis, which works like a straw. It sticks its proboscis into your skin and searches for a vein or blood vessel. Once it finds one, it starts to suck blood. Mosquitoes can drink two to three times their body weight. Once it leaves, you start to feel itchy. This is because of the mosquito’s saliva, which causes hypersensitive allergic reactions. Now you know how a mosquito sucks blood, but is it really that dangerous?
Are mosquitoes dangerous? Absolutely.
Mosquitoes may seem harmless for the most part, but they can be deadly. Mosquitoes can transmit a large number of diseases. A few examples are the West Nile virus, yellow fever, malaria, Zika, and Heartworm disease. Many of these diseases can be extremely fatal. Although mosquitoes are not as big of a problem in the United States, they are life-threatening and extremely prominent in other countries. They can even be transmitted to other animals like deer. So, if they are so dangerous, how do we fend off against these atrocious insects? Easy. It’s two words, the first one starts with a B and ends with a G, and the second one starts with an S and ends with a Y. Can you guess?
