Text丨Look at the present
Editor丨Look at the present
What exactly are mosquitoes used for on Earth?
Some netizens once did a ranking survey on the most hated animals, and at the beginning there were snakes, lizards, etc. on the list, but in the end, only mosquitoes were left far ahead, and some people added that although every creature has a reason for its existence, mosquitoes are useless, usually only sucking blood, buzzing and disturbing people's dreams, plus it carries a lot of germs, which is even more annoying.
So, what would happen if all mosquitoes really became extinct one day?
Mosquitoes may be all year round?
Many netizens said that mosquitoes seem to have become more and more rampant in recent years, and they can be seen even in winter, what is going on?
Two weeks ago, experts released an analysis of the reasons for the increase in mosquitoes, and the most fundamental reason is that it is due to global warming.
David Guillen, director of the French Institute of Insect Biology, pointed out that insects' biological clocks need to meet two conditions at the same time to enter hibernation: lower temperatures and shorter daylight hours, but now these two conditions are becoming more and more difficult to meet at the same time, resulting in insects being active for 1-2 months longer than in the past.
The news that mosquitoes may continue to live all year round has attracted widespread attention, and more seriously, the prolonged movement of mosquitoes will also cause infectious diseases such as malaria, and the death toll may double.
What is the magic of a mosquito that can shoot to death at any time that can cause such an impact?
This also starts with the mosquito itself, which has been an existence that cannot be ignored by humans in the long evolutionary history.
Archaeologists have found the shadow of the ancestors of modern mosquitoes in the Jurassic fossils 170 million years ago, and it can be said that the history of mosquitoes is much older than Homo sapiens who appeared on the earth 250,000 years ago.
Today, more than 3,600 species of mosquitoes have evolved across the globe except Antarctica, and most of these species feed on plant sap, with only about 200 species feeding on blood, including 70-80 species that actually feed on human blood.
It is these few "alternative" members who have made humanity pay a huge price, and how exactly do they do it because the spread of diseases such as malaria and yellow fever kills millions of people every year?
Mosquito hazards
Mosquitoes like to grow in a dark and humid environment, which provides a good breeding ground for various viruses and bacteria, and when mosquitoes suck human blood, they will inject pathogens into the human body, causing outbreaks of infectious diseases.
Anopheles mosquitoes can transmit the malaria-causing malaria parasite, Aedes mosquitoes transmit the severe dengue virus, and encephalitis, which has a fairly high case fatality rate, is transmitted by the bite of Culex mosquitoes.
Even today, mosquitoes pose a huge health hazard. According to WHO, an average of more than 700,000 people die each year from mosquito-borne diseases, with 830,000 deaths from mosquito-borne diseases in 2015 alone.
Among the many mosquito-borne infectious diseases, malaria is the most harmful. Along with AIDS and tuberculosis, it is known as the world's top three public health problems, causing more than 400,000 deaths each year.
Dengue fever is also very fatal, usually between 15% and 50%, and it is also mainly transmitted by mosquitoes, causing severe damage to multiple systems in the body, and in recent years, the spread of Zika virus has also been strongly linked to mosquitoes.
From a small point of view, after a mosquito bites, we will have an allergic reaction, resulting in redness, swelling, itching, pain and other symptoms, from a large point of view, mosquitoes are a common vector of many infectious diseases, people seem to find it difficult to find the value of the existence of mosquitoes, in this case, why do mosquitoes still exist?
Ecological value of mosquitoes
Of course, it is because mosquitoes are really valuable in themselves in addition to bringing people pain, and they are an important member of the biological chain.
There are about 3,600 species of mosquitoes in the world, and they are widely distributed in various ecosystems and play different roles. Mosquitoes are large in number and small in size, making them an ideal food source, for example, during the migration of birds, one of their food sources is the large number of mosquitoes in the air.
Mosquitoes lay eggs in the water, and the larvae also live in the water, and they use their small mouthparts to feed on the organic detritus in the water, which comes from the excrement and carcasses of aquatic organisms.
Unlike blood-sucking female mosquitoes, male mosquitoes have underdeveloped mouthparts and cannot suck blood, they only live on nectar, etc., when the male mosquitoes fly among the flowers, trying to suck the nectar, the pollen is contaminated with their thick and soft hair, and these "nectar hunters" then fly to the next flower, invisibly completing the pollination process.
This is especially true in cold regions, where most insects do not survive the winter due to the cold climate, and mosquitoes become one of the few pollinators that remain active.
What would happen if mosquitoes were exterminated?
As a member of the biological chain, there are many animals that depend on it upstream and downstream, and if mosquitoes are really extinct, unexpected results may occur.
There are concerns that after the disappearance of mosquitoes, the plants that rely on their pollination will decline or even become extinct, but scientific studies have shown that mosquitoes have little effect on plant pollination, and most plants rely on more specialized pollinators such as bees, moths, etc. for pollination, and mosquitoes play a negligible role in this process.
However, mosquitoes are indeed important for the maintenance of the food chain of some animals, and fish, amphibians, birds, etc., which feed on mosquitoes, may not be able to adapt due to the sudden disappearance of mosquitoes, which is manifested in the sharp decline of these animal populations, and the possibility of local extinction of individual species.
For example, the Arctic region has a large number of mosquitoes, and a large number of birds migrate here every year to feed, and if the mosquitoes suddenly disappear, the survival of these birds will be severely affected.
This gives us a revelation that even if we really want to eliminate mosquitoes, we should clearly delineate which areas need to be completely eliminated and which places need to be preserved, such as some nature reserves, in order to maintain biodiversity, it is necessary to retain an appropriate amount of mosquito resources, mosquitoes as a food source for other organisms, can help ensure the balance of the ecosystem.