Effects of blood meal sources on the biological characteristics of Aedes aegypti and Culex pipiens (Diptera: Culicidae)

Mosquitoes transmit many diseases to humans and animals e.g., malaria, yellow fever, dengue, filariasis and encephalitis. The fundamental target of this search was to study the effect of three different blood meal sources (human; rabbit and pigeon) on some biological and behavioral properties of Aedes aegypti and Culex pipiens. The results have assured that the females of the mosquito Ae. aegypti that were fed on human blood meal has registered the highest feeding activity from feeding on the blood meal whereas the females of the other mosquito Cx. pipiens have shown the highest feeding activity after being fed on pigeons when compared with its feeding on other factors. The results have shown non-significant variation in the average time necessary to digest the blood meal on both mosquito species Ae. aegypti and Cx. pipiens that were fed on vertebrate hosts under laboratory conditions. Furthermore, results assured that the difference in blood meal sources has yielded distinct variation in the reproductive capacity and efficiency of both female mosquitoes under investigation where both species Ae. aegypti and Cx. pipiens already fed on human blood meal have yielded a pronounced distinctive increase in egg production (oviposition) when compared with females that were fed on pigeon or rabbit blood meal respectively. Moreover, feeding of the female mosquitoes under lab conditions on different blood meal sources did not affect the level of the hatching eggs that were laid by both mosquito females.(c) 2022 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of King Saud University. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).