Mosquito Culture?

[Mime454]

Has anyone tried culturing mosquitoes instead of fruit flies(or as an intermediate between fruit and house flies)? My Mantids seem to really like them. I know they have an aquatic larval form, but does anyone have any recipes for success with them?

They're everywhere, so they can't be hard to raise.

 

[Paradoxica]

I'm not 100% on this, but don't the females need mammalian blood to reproduce?

 

[Mime454]

I think they do. I'm up for a sacrifice.

I don't really care about reproducing them. I just want to harvest to larvae and feed off the adults.

 

[Danny.]

A bucket or tub with standing water? My turtle setups are full of larvae this time of year.

 

[Introvertebrate]

You could put the larvae in a cup, inside your mantis enclosure. Then, just allow them to morph into mosquitoes.

 

[Ntsees]

No need to sacrifice yourself. Just look for their floating raft egg cases and collect them for hatching.

 

[Coneja]

I would just try the standing water method: leave it outside and you'll get some soon enough. Harvesting the adults might be tough, though... You'd have to put some sort of screen over the water but then I'd have no idea how you'd get the adults into mantis containers. I like the idea of having them hatch directly into the mantis enclosure, but that much standing water makes me worried about mantids falling in. (Don't know how often this happens: just remember reading it in one of the mantis care books.)

Whatever you choose, I'd be interested to see what the result is. I think mosquitos would be a great feeder, if you can get around the logistics of transferring them: they're plentiful and have a nice size.

 

[ScienceGirl]

Put a large bucket of water outside. Just let it sit... and sit... and sit... Until you see little wiggly mosquito larva swimming around in it. Put tightly woven mesh net or something like that over it to contain the adult form of your mosquitos.

You'll get hatched larva that way, but I'm not sure how well a continuous culture would work... :/

ALSO if you decide to stop with the mosquitos, or don't like them, don't leave standing water out. Change birdbaths regularly, don't let water stand in unused tires, etc. I'm sure I speak for a majority of the population when I say that the less mosquitos there are, the happier my skin is!

 

[patrickfraser]

I don't like mosquitos. I would not even try to culture those. I stick with fruit flies until a mantis can tackle a GB or BB.

 

[dgerndt]

I'm with Patrick on this one. As much as I like the idea of my mantises devouring those awful things and getting some revenge, I really would hate it one got out in my house. And I really can't see myself letting them live, even if they are food for my precious babies.

 

[glock34girl]

Don't they transmit West Nike Virus? I know our city puts out a ton if money for a team that goes around and gives peeps fish to eat Mosquitos and such. I am not a fan. Ill stick to culturing my FF and BB. Lol

 

[Ranitomeya]

West Nile Virus infects adult female mosquitoes when they feed on blood that contains the virus--the virus is not vertically transmitted so mosquito larvae are not infected with the virus. It's usually only birds that are able to successfully infect feeding mosquitoes due to low virus titers in the blood of infected humans, so you have nothing to worry about unless you're feeding your mosquitoes with a bird infected with the virus.

 

[mantid_mike]

i really hate mosquitoes. :gun_bandana:

 

[Ranitomeya]

I hate adult female mosquitoes, but the larvae are too easy to culture and use as feeders for my aquatic pets. I'm far more tolerant of the mosquitoes we have locally than the ones I've had to deal with in Taiwan--those tropical mosquito species tended to land and feed immediately unlike the species local to my area that are less aggressive in feeding behavior.