BATS AS MOSQUITO DESTROYERS 179 
favorable work of the spoon-bill duck, which he thought is particularly adapted 
to the destruction of mosquito larve resting at the surface of the water. Mr. 
McAtee, of the Biological Survey, has recently found mosquitoes in the gizzard 
of the Mallard (Anas platyrhynchos). 
Doctor Smith has recorded the fact that some of the shore birds eat mosquito 
larvee in considerable numbers. He examined the stomachs of a ring-necked 
plover (Zgialitis semipalmata), of a least sandpiper (Pisobia minutilla), 
and of a semipalmated sandpiper (Hrewnetes pusillus), and all of these had 
eaten the larva of Aédes sollicitans in some numbers, the ring-necked plover 
having eaten the most. He states, and this has also been our experience, that 
there was no especial difficulty in identifying the larvee from the remains, the 
head and breathing-tube are so strongly chitinous that they are not digested. 
W. L. McAtee, in a recent circular of the Biological Survey, sums up our 
knowledge of the office of shorebirds in the control of mosquitoes as follows: 
“ Shorebirds perform an important service by their inroads upon mosquitoes, 
some of which play so conspicuous a part in the dissemination of diseases. Thus, 
nine species are known to feed upon mosquitoes, and hundreds of the larve or 
‘wigglers’ were found in several stomachs. Fifty-three per cent of the food of 
28 northern phalaropes from one locality consisted of mosquito larve. The in- 
sects eaten include the salt-marsh mosquito (Aédes sollicitans), for the suppres- 
sion of which the State of New Jersey has gone to great expense. The nine 
species of shorebirds known to eat mosquitoes are: 
“ Northern phalarope (Lobipes lobatus). 
Wilson phalarope (Steganopus tricolor). 
Stilt sandpiper (Micropalama himantopus). 
Pectoral sandpiper (Pisobia maculata). 
Baird sandpiper (Pisobia bairdt). 
Least sandpiper (Pisobia minutilla). 
Semipalmated sandpiper (Lreunetes pusillus) . 
Killdeer (Oxyechus vociferus). 
Semipalmated plover (Aegialitis semipalmata).” 
BATS. 
Bats are important mosquito-destroying animals. Flying at dusk and after 
dark, and capturing all flying insects upon the wing, they devour large numbers 
of adult mosquitoes in times of mosquito prevalence. Mr. C. Few Seiss, at a 
meeting of the Feldman Collecting Social, in Philadelphia, June 19, 1901, 
stated that he had dissected a specimen of the common brown bat (Hptesicus 
fuscus), and had found its stomach full of mosquitoes. The suggestion has been 
made by Mr. A. C. Weeks, of Brooklyn, that an attempt be made to breed bats 
artificially on account of their importance as mosquito destroyers, but until 
recently no one seems to have taken the matter up. 
Greatly impressed with the value of bats as mosquito destroyers, Dr. Chas. A. 
R. Campbell, formerly city bacteriologist of San Antonio, Texas, has erected a 
novel bat breeding-house six miles south of that city. His idea is that the bats 
will rapidly become sufficiently numerous, with this admirably adapted nesting 
place, to rid the neighborhood of night-flying mosquitoes, and at the same time 
the entire expense will be more than paid by having the structure built in such a 
manner that the bat-guano can be readily collected and taken away. 
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