Most people will have felt on own skin this summer, Germany is haunted by more mosquitoes than in past years.
Doreen Werner of the Leibniz-centre for agricultural landscape research (ZALF) in Müncheberg, near Berlin, confirmed this. After two dry summers in a row, with significantly less mosquitoes in the exchange of humidity and heat this year was very mosquito-friendly, said the biologist of the German press Agency.
Mosquito infestation, especially where it rains a lot
“The harassment is regional but very different.” Where heavy rainfall caused the water levels of the waters are rising, speaks of plague, the researcher of a mosquito. Examples are the Or, but also the lake Starnberger see and the Ammersee in Bavaria.
In Germany, more than 50 species of mosquitoes are the expert, according to the home. In the past two years were mostly house mosquitoes, which were about in rain barrels or puddles of their eggs. This summer, the so-called flooding, according to Werner mosquito boom.
Mosquitoes plague: 20 mosquitoes per Minute
In flooding areas, for example the biologist per Minute registered a hint of more than 100 flood mosquitoes for receiving a blood meal. Of a plague, one can speak of approximately 20 mosquitoes per Minute. The Or led in the last few weeks of high water due to lots of rain, especially in southern Poland and the Czech Republic.
The water flows from the flooded areas and ditches in the floodplain forests and meadows not so fast, says Werner. There developed currently, mosquitoes are very good, the warm temperatures shortened their development time.
Flooding is the most troublesome blood suckers are mosquitoes
Flood mosquitoes are very stechlustig, because they were under development pressure. According to the scientist, you need to suck in the shortest amount of time, blood, their eggs develop and then drop in order to allow over the summer, as many generations.
The biologist uses the high mosquito emergence for their research. So you want to examine in a comparative way, if any of the local mosquitoes to transfer to the same extent as immigrant mosquitoes such as the Asian tiger mosquito – pathogens. Further studies would be carried out at the Friedrich-Loeffler-Institute (FLI), Federal research Institute for animal health,.
Important research work on domestic mosquitoes do
To know invasive mosquitoes such as the tiger mosquito or the Asian Bush mosquito, which is widely used in Germany is relatively far, it is good, what disease could transmit the agent to you, says Helge Kampen, from the Friedrich-Loeffler-Institut.
Asian tiger mosquitoes are considered as Vectors of tropical pathogens such as Zika-, Chikungunya and Dengue Virus. “Such knowledge is missing for us is actually still largely in the control of local mosquitoes,” explains the scientist.
This is due to the fact that the topic has been neglected. On the other, many of the local mosquitoes could not be bred. Now the Chance was here, with the variety of flood mosquitoes in laboratory infection experiments.
Asian tiger mosquitoes arrived in Germany
The biologist Werner compares currently faces, Or, the Spree, the Elbe, the Weser and the Rhine, to see what are the ecological niches to be colonized by invasive species.
Populations of the Asian tiger mosquito, there is according to her, already in the Federal States of Bavaria, Baden Württemberg, Thüringen, and Hessen. The study will examine whether the animals migrate to other regions such as Berlin and Brandenburg.
Deutsche Presse-Agentur (dpa)
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