210 MOSQUITO ERADICATION 



offensive measures against the adult should not be developed as a 

 supplementary procedure. In the plague campaigns against 

 rats and ground-squirrels, direct offensive measures are used 

 against adults with great success. The same may be said, to 

 some extent, in regard to flies. 



Again, it may be said that there is plenty of scope for further 

 protective measures against adults. There are millions of homes 

 that are not screened, and many of these cannot be screened 

 effectively. Furthermore, as already pointed out, screening is 

 protective only in the place that is screened. For these reasons, 

 other protective measures should be utilized wherever and when- 

 ever it appears that they will be of any value. 



DIRECT EXTERMINATIVE MEASURES 



The following measures for attacking the adult mosquito 

 appear to have more or less value or to offer possibilities of 

 further development : 



1. Direct exterminative measures, preferably by some biologi- 

 cal enemy. 



2. Indirect methods of harassing and annoying, such as 

 destroying or rendering unattractive its harboring and resting 

 places. 



The most practical application of direct exterminative meas- 

 sures against the adult mosquito would seem to be use of some 

 biological enemy. The use of fish against the earlier stages of 

 the mosquito is an example of the value of this procedure. There 

 remains only to find some animal that is adapted for destruction 

 of the adult mosquito. 



THE BAT AS A DESTROYER OF ADULT MOSQUITOES 



Doctor Campbell of San Antonio, Tex., for many years has 

 expounded the view that the domestic bat, Chiroptera, can be 

 utilized as a means of exterminating adult mosquitoes, and, as 

 a result of his advocacy, San Antonio and other cities have 

 installed bat-roosts for this specific purpose. The idea is to 

 encourage development of enough bats in each community greatly 

 to reduce, if not eliminate, the mosquito pest. 



While Doctor Campbell fortifies his arguments with a mass of 

 resolutions and letters of approval, which apparently sustain 

 his conclusions, there seems to be a certain amount of doubt 



