Rural School Licaflet toq? 



TWO HOUSEHOLD PESTS 

 Glenn W. Herrick 

 the house mosquito 



Appearance of the mosquito. — The house mosquito is a small fly with 

 two wings, long, slender legs, and a slender proboscis, or beak, with which 

 it penetrates the skin and sucks the blood. The male mosquito has 

 hairy appendages on the head, but does not " bite." 



Story of its life. — The house mosquito lays its eggs in boat-shaped 

 masses, which float on the surface of water in rain barrels, tin cans, ponds, 

 streams, and pools. The masses of eggs are dark brown, and look like 

 minute specks or soot floating on the water. In one or two days the eggs 

 hatch into tiny wigglers, or larval mosquitoes. These wigglers, or wrigglers, 

 are very active, but they have a tube on the end of the body through which 

 they take in air, and therefore they rest during a part of the time near the 

 top of the water with the head hanging downward and the tip end of the 

 tube projecting into the air. In about a week the wigglers change to 

 pupae, which appear to have large heads and slender tails. 



The pupae live for four or five days, when the skin breaks open along the 

 back and the mosquito crawls out, dries its wings, and flies away. 



Control. — Drain all pools and ponds of water, and empty tin cans and 

 rain barrels in which mosquitoes may breed; or pour oil on top of the 

 water, which will kill the wigglers. Sometimes small fish, such as minnows, 

 can be put into ponds and pools, and these will destroy the wigglers. The 

 windows and porches of houses may be screened as a protection from the 

 annoyance of mosquitoes. 



THE HOUSE FLY 



Appearance of the fly. — Several kinds of flies are often mistaken for 

 house flies. The house fly varies in size according to the quantity of food 

 that the maggots obtain and to the temperature surrounding them while 

 they are growing. 



The house fly is grayish brown in color, with four dark lines on the 

 thorax just behind the head; and one of the main long veins in each wing 

 turns abruptly upward at the end. The body and the legs are covered 

 with rather long, stiff hairs. 



Story of its life. — The small, white, slightly curved eggs are laid in 

 decaying vegetable material, especially horse manure. They hatch in 

 twenty-four hours into maggots, which reach their full growth in five or 

 six days and change to dark brown objects known as puparia. The 

 pupag, inside the puparia, rest quietly for about five days, and then trans- 

 form to the adult flies. There may be eight or ten generations each 

 season — each generation, of course, containing more flies than the pre- 

 ceding one. 



