Why mosquitoes drink blood

The question is why mosquitoes drink blood, torment every lover of summer vacations, or who at least once has encountered these annoying insects. For mosquitoes blood is not just a favorite treat, but an effective way to continue your kind. Without enough biological material, a complete mosquito life and breeding.

What is needed for

To understand why mosquitoes drink blood, you need to look at the composition of this fluid. Human or animal blood in large quantities contains protein. It is a valuable source of energy and building material for the formation of mosquito offspring. Having received a sufficient amount of material, the female goes to the masonry.

Many representatives of the Diptera squad have the ability to postpone offspring only 1 time. Mosquito females with an average life expectancy of only 2-3 months do this several times.

Interesting!

The largest number of clutches registered with malaria mosquitoes. Their female can leave offspring up to 12 times in her life.

Mosquitoes need blood before each clutch. A direct relationship was established between the amount of fluid drunk and the quality of the offspring. The more protein in the mosquito, the stronger and more numerous the offspring.

Who drinks: female or male

When deciding which mosquito drinks blood, one should turn to their physiological needs. Given that the female is engaged in the reproduction of offspring in the mosquito family, then only female individuals feed on blood. Mosquito menu males are represented by plant foods: flower nectar. They do not have such a proboscis and a slightly different structure of the oral apparatus.

Males need a diet rich in carbohydrates, which for a long time gives a feeling of satiety. Also, this method of nutrition is the key to the reproduction of some plants whose pollen is carried by insects during a food search.

Interesting!

The need for blood from a mosquito female is so high that during a meal, she can not stop. The bloodsucker stops drinking blood only when his body increases several times and the abdomen is not completely filled. How many times a mosquito bites, depends on the actions of the victim and the degree of hunger of the female.

How does reproduction occur?

The ability to reproduce in females appears already 3-4 days after becoming an adult. Already from this time, she can come into contact with the male. After that, she needs protein and the search for the victim begins.

Special antennas help catch the smell of a food source for mosquitoes. The radius of the action is about 1 km. Bloodsuckers find their victim by such signs:

1. Heat.
2. The smell of sweat.
3. Carbon dioxide, which is released during breathing.

Description of the process of how a mosquito drinks blood:

1. After finding the victim, the insect selects a place for a bite. It should be warm, pulsating and with thin skin.
2. Then, with the help of a proboscis, the female pierces the human epidermis and immediately saliva. It contains a special substance that prevents rapid coagulation and makes it possible to finish the meal. The same enzyme provokes an allergic reaction to a mosquito bite, the appearance of blisters, redness and swelling.
3. It is impossible to determine exactly when the mosquito drank blood, since the female will eat as much as she can.
4. After a bite, mosquito females go to look for a place for masonry and reproduce offspring.

Interesting!

In some species, such as urban basement squeaks, it is possible to make the first clutch even with a bloodless diet. But immediately after the first breeding, individuals go in search of warm-blooded victims.

An average mosquito leaves about 200 eggs per clutch. But reproduction is also possible with a bloodless diet of dipterans. In this case, the number of eggs is reduced to 40 pieces, the offspring are weak and few survive to the adult stage, dying in the stage larvae. The female herself suffers. After all, to lay eggs she has to spend her own reserves of protein. Therefore, often after this, the bloodsucker dies.

Who bite

Mosquitoes are very ancient inhabitants of the Earth. Scientists have even found several fossil species that have not survived to this day. Today, the mosquito family has about 3,000 species and each of them has distinctive features. To multiply and continue to grow, they all need blood. Only the sacrifice of different species can have its own.

Small mosquitoes familiar in the city of squeak have adapted and drink human blood. But not necessarily mosquitoes suck human blood. They are attracted to the material of most warm-blooded. It can be cats, dogs, cattle or birds. There are also species that require blood of only a particular type of animal.

Important!

Studies have shown that animal biological fluids are better suited for reproduction than human fluids. The female who chose to prey on birds gave 2 times more offspring than the one that sucked human blood.

There are also mosquito species in the world that prefer to feed on the biological fluid of certain species of fish or frogs. And tropical bloodsuckers drink caterpillar lymph.

People's fears that big mosquitoes they drink blood and are able to drink all wrong and have no scientific justification. Representatives of this species are called karamora and lead an exclusively herbivorous lifestyle. They do not pose a danger to humans. However, the question is can mosquitoes bite to death, for inquiring minds remains open.

Thus, it became clear why bloodsuckers bite humans and animals. The bloodthirst for mosquitoes is not a whim or a desire to harm warm-blooded animals, but only a way to survive and have the ability to fully reproduce in order to maintain their own populations.