Unfortunately, the height of the summer holiday season
coincides with the peak period for mosquitoes in this part of the world.
If you find yourself lying in bed wide awake one night
listening to a buzzing sound, you may like to ponder the following.
The troublemakers are all females. Only female mosquitoes
bite. They suck blood. The males feed only on plant nectar. They have no
interest in blood.
The bloodsuckers prefer some people to others. It depends
on how sweet smelling your sweat is. Victims are attacked with a skin-piercing proboscis
(if you will forgive the technical term). Ingested blood provides protein for
the mosquito’s eggs.
The trouble is that during this piercing proboscis
procedure, mosquitoes are liable to pass on diseases such as malaria, yellow
fever, filariasis and dengue.
While males are harmless, female mosquitoes are the most
dangerous creatures on the planet. Each year they infect around 700 million
people, as well as many other animals, some of them fatally.
But don’t let any of this unduly worry you as you lie
awake at night listening to a buzzing sound. Of the 3,500 or so species of
mosquitoes in the world, none of those found in Portugal are lethal or even
dangerous.
Malaria was present in Portugal until the 1950s but it was
then eradicated. Resurgence, in tandem with global warming, is possible but the
likelihood of this anytime soon is considered low. For now at least, mosquitoes
in Portugal
are just a bloody nuisance.
You can curse them, but you also have to admire them. For
sheer determination, persistence and efficiency they have no equal. Despite the
serried ranks of human fortifications in the shape of window screens, hanging
nets, electric plug-in devices, insecticide coils, aerosol sprays and repellent
creams, female mozzies carry on doing what they do best.
They have had plenty of practice. The fossil record shows
that mozzies have been around for at least 50 million years. If we were to
stretch that a little bit, we see that they may have cohabited with the
dinosaurs. Could it be that the humble mosquito was responsible for the demise
of the dinosaurs? Just another thought as you are lying awake.
No mozzies have yet been found on Mars but they certainly feel totally at home here on earth,
especially just after the sun goes down on warm starry evenings.
As you are enjoying a gin and tonic or a glass of wine on
the terrace, the maternal mozzies are out and about in search of blood while
their mates are innocently sipping fruit juice. What a life, eh!