Iceland Just Found Its First Mosquitoes

An anonymous reader quotes a report from CNN: Iceland's frozen, inhospitable winters have long protected it from mosquitoes, but that may be changing. This week, scientists announced the discovery of three mosquitoes -- marking the country's first confirmed finding of these insects in the wild. Mosquitoes are found almost everywhere in the world, with the exception of Antarctica and, until very recently, Iceland, due to their extreme cold.

The mosquitoes were discovered by Bjorn Hjaltason in Kioafell, Kjos, in western Iceland about 20 miles north of the capital Reykjavik. 'At dusk on October 16, I caught sight of a strange fly,' Hjaltason posted in a Facebook group about insects, according to reports in the Icelandic media. 'I immediately suspected what was going on and quickly collected the fly,' he added.

He contacted Matthias Alfreosson, an entomologist at the Natural Science Institute of Iceland, who drove out to Hjaltason's house the next day. They captured three in total, two females and a male. Alfreosson identified them as mosquitoes from the Culiseta annulata species. A single mosquito from a different species was discovered many years ago on an airplane at the country's Keflavik International Airport, Alfreosson told CNN, but this 'is the first record of mosquitoes occurring in the natural environment in Iceland.' Further monitoring will be needed in the spring to see whether the species can survive the winter and 'truly become established in Iceland,' Alfreosson said. He said he's not sure climate change played a role in the discovery but 'warming temperatures are likely to enhance the potential for other mosquito species to establish in Iceland, if they arrive.'

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