A poor move if you want mosquito protection.
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In 1997, the University of Florida’s medical entomological laboratory tallied the death toll from one bug zapper over a single night: 10,000 insects. Just eight were mosquitoes. Similar studies reflected those findings.
Around the same time, researchers at the University of Delaware used a bug zapper to trap 13,789 insects over a summer. Only 31 — 0.22 percent — were biting insects such as mosquitoes and gnats. What did it kill?
Beneficial bugs, mostly. Roughly half the victims — 6,670 insects — were harmless aquatic species from nearby rivers and streams, fish food in the aquatic food chain. Many of the others were parasitic wasps and beetles that naturally prey on mosquitoes.
Mosquitoes are not fooled by zappers because, along with other bloodsucking insects, they have evolved to home in on animals’ exhaled carbon dioxide, not ultraviolet light, scientists say. Even if mosquitoes are drawn in by a bug zapper, they will immediately redirect their attention to their favorite foods: warmblooded mammals, especially humans.
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