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Mosquitos already?



I was bemused to find an egg raft (looking like a tiny piece
of floating charcoal, scratched out by a fingernail) bobbing in an
indoor water holding container. Placed in a small jar of tank water,
they began hatching the next day and were presented to some small fry.

        Outside the daphnia have only begun hatching out in the last
week or so (it seems to take their eggs/cysts 1-2 weeks to hatch after
ice out), but there are already small to medium mosquito larvae in some
of the more explosed (and sun-warmed) growing containers. Usually
mosquitos don't show up until later in northern Illinois. A walk by a
local pond yesterday showed quite a bit of insect/gnat (bloodworm?)
activity, as those creatures cruised the surface. Recently the weather
got cold enough to put the mosquito growth on hold - they can be swept
up with that fine mesh net and fed to smaller killies at one's leisure,
but is this another El Nino factor? Will it be a great (warm) summer for
the mosquitos, a tough one for the daphnia?

                                All the best,

                                Scott