• There are 3,500 named species of mosquito,

• Malaria infects some 247 million people worldwide each year, and kills nearly one million.

• Anything that can hold water for more than a few days can be a potential breeding ground for mosquitoes.

• Mosquitoes are vectors of diseases. This means they carry and transmit a disease without getting affected themselves.·    Theaverage life span of a female mosquito is three to 100 days. The male lives for 10 to 20 days.

• Mosquitoes breed in standing water so areas like rain gutters, tree holes, old buckets or tires with stagnant water are major breeding sites.

• A mosquito’s wings beat 300-600 times per second, which causes the irritating buzzing sound you hear just before a mosquito lands on you and bites.

• Mosquitoes have weak eyes. Carbon dioxide exhaled by humans and other animals is the key signal to mosquitoes that a potential victim is nearby. — G. T.