2.5 inch Mosquito: A Shocking Discovery

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In summary, a 2.5 inch mosquito was having dinner when it saw a huge insect crawl towards it. It was a long-legged mosquito and the mosquito was scared. The mosquito looked up on the internet and found out that the insect was a cranefly and it was not to be feared. Someone can catch a great fish with this, but the mosquito does not want to be in the fish. Finally, the mosquito and the cranefly belong to the same family and they are harmless.
  • #1
Monique
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2.5 inch mosquito

:bugeye: I was having my dinner and all of a sudden I see something crawling towards me, a HUGE insect.. the thing is at least 2.5 inches big, never seen something like it.

Quite shaken I ran to the kitchen to get something to contain it in, emptied a glass jar with black-eyed peas in it and tried to put it on it, but the thing barely fits in the opening so I retrieved a metal coliander and put it over it.

I looked it up on the internet and apparently it is a long-legged mosquito, I guess it had been hibrinating and just wake up (it was dragging itself over the floor).. ack NOW what am I supposed to do, release it to the wild (I'm not sure if I dare to touch that coliander) and risk letting it multiply?

http://www.natuurlijk-een-tuin.nl/nieuw/leven/langpoot.jpg
 
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  • #2
Leave the poor mosquito alone :mad: How would you feel if I put you in a glass jar?
 
  • #3
I could have put a pan on top of it, but then he would have been in the dark, so that's why I opted to empty the glass jar, and the coliander has holes in it :wink:

Someone can catch a great fish with this, but I don't want it in my house! :cry:
 
  • #4
Atleast you're being somewhat hospitable
 
  • #5
Wait, here it is, apparently it is a cranefly and it's freaking me out!
cranefly-hand.jpg
 
  • #6
Is that your hand? It's pretty big.
 
  • #7
You think I'd let my hand near that thing?
 
  • #8
Aaack, I've seen those before.
 
  • #9
How the hell do you dare to handle that horrible thing?. Nobody knows what illness could transmit you with its sting.
 
  • #10
Mosquitos are the one species of animals I truly want to eradicate from the face of the Earth. I hate them. I hate them with every fiber of my being. :devil:
 
  • #11
Entropy said:
Mosquitos are the one species of animals I truly want to eradicate from the face of the Earth. I hate them. I hate them with every fiber of my being. :devil:

Agreed. Although these are CRANEFLIES.

I would personally just let it go. It only lives above the surface a few days for mating, let it appreciate that short time.
 
  • #12
Aww, it's so cute! o:)
 
  • #13
Deep-fry it and eat it.
 
  • #14
Mosquitos are just like humans... the only ones that are bloodsuckers are females. :biggrin:
 
  • #15
gravenewworld said:
Mosquitos are just like humans... the only ones that are bloodsuckers are females. :biggrin:
Now, now, grave... Females m's respond to surface temperature, so the order of their biting preferences is: pregnant human females, then human females, then human males.
 
  • #16
We get those here but much bigger. The last time Integral and Differential came by for dinner, we had quite a fiasco getting one out of the kitchen.
 
  • #17
I'd use it in a science project, e.g., add a smallish frog into the mixture then see what happens (which one lives).
 
  • #18
I'd use it in a science project, e.g., add a smallish frog into the mixture then see what happens (which one lives).

YES! It will be like gladiators! Fight to the dealth for our amusement! :biggrin: :devil:
 
  • #19
Here we go. We got a picture of Integral just after he caught it.
http://img106.echo.cx/img106/5947/flyingbob22cw.jpg
 
  • #20
That giant bug is trying to comb Integral's hair.
 
  • #21
Grotesque Puppet said:
Leave the poor mosquito alone :mad: How would you feel if I put you in a glass jar?
:smile:
I don't think mosquito's have the brain capacity to feel complex emotions.
 
  • #22
Monique said:
I could have put a pan on top of it, but then he would have been in the dark, so that's why I opted to empty the glass jar, and the coliander has holes in it :wink:

Someone can catch a great fish with this, but I don't want it in my house! :cry:
I'm ready to keep it at my home. o:) Could you please lend your mosquito? :rolleyes:
 
  • #23
The long-legged mosquito and the cranefly both belong to the family Tipulidae (giant mosquitoes). There are many species, but they are totally harmless. They do not suck blood, like the females of the normal (small) mosquitoes do. They live most of their lives in a larval stage, and in the “flying stage” they either do not eat, or they eat a little bit of nectar and will only live for a few days (to mate and deposit the fertilized eggs).

So they are not to be feared at all, and EnumaElish the frog will win or none will. I was surprised that you did not know these Monique, since they are so very common certainly in the Netherlands. I always saw so very many of them in the summer months. You can easily catch them by hand and throw them out; they always seem a bit drowsy.
 
  • #24
Crane Flies are harmless. We call them Mosquito Hawks because they look like giant mosquitoes, but they aren't mosquitoes and don't bite.

But, while I was surfing around to look up a picture of what a Crane Fly is because the one posted here is a huge file that's still opening (I got impatient and just looked elsewhere), I finally found out what the beast was that I had on the screen of an apartment about 6 years ago. Fortunately it was on the outside, but I couldn't get a good picture of it through the screen.

If you want to see a SCARY looking insect, check out Dobsonflies! http://www.whatsthatbug.com/dobs.html That sucker was as big as my pinky finger and those pincers are vicious looking!
 
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  • #25
So is THIS a Dobsonfly?

http://img360.imageshack.us/img360/5094/caddisfly2et.jpg

I was told they were Caddis flies, but they look more like yours, MB. These are all over the place here in Oregon. Well, at least they're all over OUR place. They're interesting, pretty and harmless. I like them. :approve: I like the look of their 'train track' antennae.
 
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  • #26
We get caterpillar-looking insects (are caterpillars insects?) in the living room; they are about the length of a pinkie and harmless. I suspect that the cat occasionally uses them for hunting practice but never caught her doing it.

The scariest insect I ever encountered was a shiny black mofo about the size of a golf ball and as hard. It had gotten into the kitchen during the night. Somewhow it got into the cabinet under the sink and we shut it in. It started charging the cabinet door from inside. It would propel itself and hit the wood with a sound that you'd expect a golf ball to make. We closed the kitchen door shut and stuffed old newspapers under it so it couldn't come out. Apparently it got out of the cabinet by chewing its way through wood and then started eating the newspapers under the door. It was charging us! We kept stuffing more paper as it kept shredding them on the other side of the door, for hours. Then dawn broke and there was light outside. It left the kitchen to go back to wherever it came from. Only then everybody could go to sleep.

P.S. I should have said millipede, not caterpillar. I think they are millipedes.
 
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  • #27
Perhaps Monique's had Kim chee for dinner and this mosquito came to her home because of this yummy dinner. :-p
 
  • #28
Tsu said:
So is THIS a Dobsonfly?

I was told they were Caddis flies, but they look more like yours, MB. These are all over the place here in Oregon. Well, at least they're all over OUR place. They're interesting, pretty and harmless. I like them. :approve: I like the look of their 'train track' antennae.
I don't think that's a Dobsonfly. The Dobsonfly didn't seem to have antennae like that, and yours doesn't have evil looking pincers.

I looked up Caddis flies, and it looks like some on this page:
http://www.fcps.k12.va.us/StratfordLandingES/Ecology/mpages/northern_caddis_fly.htm

There's something else on the Dobsonfly page I linked to that is called a Fishfly that has feathery antennae and the wings look more like the wings on the picture you posted. The comment says that it's closely related to the Dobsonfly. But those aren't train track looking antennae on the Fishfly either. So, maybe a Caddis fly is also something related to a Dobsonfly. I'm certainly no entomologist. I've just seen one Dobsonfly in my whole life and was wondering what sort of alien life form had just landed on my window screen when I saw it! So now I'm just happy to have finally stumbled across something that identifies it (the pincers were the most notable feature along with its monstrous size).

Oh, the site I was on earlier has Caddis flies too. The first picture on their site looks a whole lot like your bug. http://www.whatsthatbug.com/caddisflies.html They don't have a close-up that shows the antennae as well as your photo does, but the wings sure seem to match. It doesn't look like they are related to the Dobsonflies afterall.
 
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  • #29
gerben said:
I was surprised that you did not know these Monique, since they are so very common certainly in the Netherlands.
Actually the first thing I thought it would we was a 'glazenwasser', a windowwasher (as that is the only name I know for those longlegged flying insects, that like glass surfaces), which are quite common. But this one was differrent, huge long body, crawling over the floor. Maybe a pregnant female, perhaps.
 
  • #30
The Dobsonfly and the Fishfly are in the same family, which does not include the Caddis. The wing placement is quite different, with the caddis it is more upright creating a tent-like wing structure, whereas the Dobsonfly and its relatives have a more flat, stacked wing set-up. Oddly I know about this more from my fly-fishing experience, than from my biology background, any of the insects mentioned in this thread are relished by trout and I've tied/purchased several fly patterns to mimic such creatures.
 
  • #31
btw, after a day of solitary confinement it was finally released into the wild by my courageous bf who picked it up with his hands :rolleyes: initially he was scared to look under the coliander by my reaction :smile:
 

FAQ: 2.5 inch Mosquito: A Shocking Discovery

1. What is the significance of the 2.5 inch mosquito?

The 2.5 inch mosquito is significant because it is an unusually large size for a mosquito. Most mosquitoes are only about 0.25-0.5 inches in length, making the 2.5 inch size almost 5 times larger than average.

2. How was the 2.5 inch mosquito discovered?

The 2.5 inch mosquito was discovered by a team of scientists who were conducting research on mosquitoes in a remote jungle. They stumbled upon the unusually large insect while collecting samples and were shocked by its size.

3. Is the 2.5 inch mosquito a new species?

At this time, it is unclear if the 2.5 inch mosquito is a new species or simply a genetic anomaly. Further research and DNA analysis will need to be done to determine its classification.

4. What are the potential implications of the 2.5 inch mosquito?

If the 2.5 inch mosquito is indeed a new species, it could have significant implications for the ecosystem and potentially for human health. It could also shed light on the evolution and adaptation of mosquitoes.

5. Are there any other known instances of giant mosquitoes?

While the 2.5 inch mosquito is a rare find, there have been other instances of giant mosquitoes reported. In 2018, a 1.5 inch mosquito was found in China and in 2019, a 3 inch mosquito was discovered in Argentina. However, these are still significantly smaller than the 2.5 inch mosquito.

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