Slashdot Mirror

It's well-known that mosquitoes are nothing's favorite food, except perhaps species we only care about because they suppress mosquitoes...

Can you provide a citation for this? "Well-known" = "totally fabricated."

Mosquitoes are one of the primary foods of most bat populations. Little brown bats can eat up to 1500 mosquitoes in a single evening. Some bats eat as much as 1,000 mosquitoes in an hour.

We care about bats. Bats don't just serve to suppress mosquitoes. They also serve as pollinators. Given the problems that the bee populations have had in the last decade, bats are becoming increasingly important to agriculture in this pollinating role. Plus they protect agriculture by eating "thousands of tons" of agricultural pests each year.

Raise more dragonflies. Dragonflies eat mosquitoes.

Of course, if we would drain all the pools at foreclosed homes, that would have a significant impact as well.

Granted, if you're in the south where there are thousands of acres of swamp land, you might have a problem breeding enough dragonflies to make a dent in the mosquito population.

Then again, bats are wonderful eaters of mosquitoes. For those who have the room, bat boxes will provide an invitation for bats to do their work. As most bats don't come out until sundown, there will be no interference with your enjoyment of your yard during the day while at night, you can watch and cheer them on as they devour those annoying mosquitoes.

So can you cite a reliable source for this story? It still sounds like an urban legend that has been contoured to fit Mr Lovins political theories.

University of Maryland Listserv has a message with the part from Lovins' "Natural Capitalism". Both provide the message and the book provide the sources they got the info from:

"Cheng, F.Y. 1963. Deterioration of thatch roofs by moth larvae after house spraying in the course of a malaria eradication programme in North Borneo. Bull. WHO 28:136-137."
"Conway, G.R. 1969. Ecological aspects of pest control in Malaysia, pp. 467-488 in Farvar, M.T. and J.P. Milton, eds. The Careless Technology. Natural History Press, New York, NY."
"Harrisson, T. 1965. Operation cat drop. Animals 5:512-513."

Try googling for just "thin egg shells lead" instead of leaded gas

Ok, I used leaded gas because that's what you used. Dropping "gas", wow too many results. Try thin egg shells lead birds OR eagles OR falcons, some of the first results were about fish eggs. The second result is from University of Southern California, The Brown Pelican which blames their "population decline and the threat of extinction" on DDT but says nothing about lead. Going through 8 pages of results looking for science or university, college, links I didn't find any saying or suggesting lead had anything to do with thin egg shells. You may wonder why I only checked science or educational links. That's because I wanted scientific links. Ah, here's one although how qualified it is I don' know. Anyway here's what ScienceMaster says on the influence of lead:

"In addition to the adverse effects of DDT, bald eagles also died from lead poisoning as a result of feeding on hunter-killed or crippled waterfowl containing lead shot and from lead shot that was inadvertently ingested by the waterfowl. (In 1991, a 5- year program to phase out the use of lead shot for waterfowl hunting was completed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.)"

I don't discount heavy metals and other things can affect egg shells, however I also think DDT does as well. I also believe spraying DDT to exterminate mosquitoes, and exterminating them, does have unforeseen cascading effects. Such as killing parasitic wasps, which allows their prey wood eating caterpillars to increase their population.

Perhaps I've been going through this the wrong way as I don't oppose controlling mosquitoes, what I oppose is how they are controlled and what causes their numbers to increase. Studies, including a United Nations study, concluded mosquito populations increase where dams are built. And the economic reasons for dams have been shot down as well. Dams cost more than they were originally sold as costing and the benefits are less than they were sold for. The study Incidence of malaria among children living near dams in northern Ethiopia: community based incidence survey" shows the incidence of malaria in children is significantly higher, sevenfold, near dams than away from them. WCD To Study Brazil's Tucurui Dam and Amazon/Tocantins River Basin says dams are "creating a vast reservoir in which disease-bearing mosquitoes breed". Methods of controlling mosquitoes, other than not creating places they can breed, are available. Though not used alone, bats can help control mosquitoes. As can birds, frogs, and lizards. From University of Florida:

Most bats are valuable allies, well worth protecting. Worldwide, they are primary predators of vast numbers of insect pests that cost farmers and foresters billions of dollars annually and spread human disease. In the United States, little brown bats often eat mosquitos and can catch up to 1,200 tiny insects in an hour. An average-sized colony of big brown bats can eat enough cucumber beetles to protect farmers from tens of millions of the beetle's rootworm larva each summer. Large colonies of Mexican free-tailed bats eat hundreds of tons of moth pests weekly. Bats play key roles in keeping a wide variety of insect populations in balance. Yet, they rank as North America's most rapidly declining and endangered land mammals. The largest known cause of decline is exaggerated human fear and persecution.

Bats are an incredibly misunderstood animal, with far more benefit to humans than generally thought. They're also incredibly interesting. Check out the Bat Conservation International website for a lot of interesting information.

http://www.batcon.org/home/default.asp

You yourself reveal that you need "eyes" to see, that is, you need 2 of them. Without mutiple eyes, you can't establish a range to anything.

And why exactly is this a problem? Are you saying that researchers couldn't successfully sync send and receive information?

As a fisherman, I can tell you that bats are amazing, they often chase my bug around as I false cast.

If you're interested in bats, I recommend you get a membership with Bats Conservation International http://www.batcon.org/ For only $30 you can be a member. And helping furry creatures is good for the soul.

I can foresee signal strength problems due to:
* snow
* swarming hordes of rampaging mosquitoes

Ever hear the joke: "Perhaps there's a reason the wind is always blowing north in Iowa... Minnesota sucks!"

BTW: I'm a former Edina MN and St. Anthony MN resident; It's a GREAT place to live! But, you've got to wear a durable environment suit in the summer early evening due to the large mosquitoe population (Land of 10,000 lakes makes for lots of stagnant breeding grounds).

Living there, I quickly learned that most people just don't go outside near sunset in the summer. It's not smart. Breathe too deeply and you'll choke on the swarms. The state needs to start an aggressive Bat breeding program to give the skeeter population a natural check besides insecticide. But, there's all sorts of misconceptions about bats, so that'll probably never happen. Alas...

Or, they could put Bat Houses on the same poles as the Wireless antennae and try to solve 2 problems at once!

"The largest urban bat populations consist almost exclusively of colonial species, and there is no evidence linking them to increased transmission to humans. Tens of thousands of people closely observe the emergences of 1.5 million Mexican free-tailed bats at the Congress Avenue Bridge in Austin, Texas each summer without incident. In fact, though Austin, San Antonio, and several other Texas Hill Country towns likely support the highest bat densities in America, they have recorded no human cases of bat-transmitted rabies."

More at http://www.batcon.org/rabies.html

I think the grandparent just likes killin' bats.

>> BIRDS?

And bats, actually.

(Although I must admit to using wind power for 100% of my electical needs).

Here's two links to within the Bat Conservation International's website that address the relative lack of danger of rabid bats, despite a lot of bad movies:
Info
chart list
It's US oriented, while the article you provide is Scotland, but still hopefully informative or at least relevant.

Here's two links to within the Bat Conservation International's website that address the relative lack of danger of rabid bats, despite a lot of bad movies:
Info
chart list
It's US oriented, while the article you provide is Scotland, but still hopefully informative or at least relevant.

Here's two links to within the Bat Conservation International's website that address the relative lack of danger of rabid bats, despite a lot of bad movies:
Info
chart list
It's US oriented, while the article you provide is Scotland, but still hopefully informative or at least relevant.

My two favorite endangered animals donation sites are the Bat Conservation International and Duke University Primate Center's Adopt-A-Lemur program.