Mosquito (Diptera: Culicidae) Ecology in Monroe County, Indiana: Diversity and Abundance Patterns Across Environmental Gradients

Abstract

West Nile virus and La Crosse virus human infections are common in Indiana. Nevertheless, there are knowledge gaps about basic mosquito ecology associated with these vector-borne diseases. These gaps handicap our ability to understand their epidemiology and to predict their response to environmental changes. Here, I investigated how environmental factors like tree height, land use and land cover (LULC), and microclimatic conditions affect mosquito diversity and abundance in Monroe County, Indiana. In the first study, I found that distinct mosquito species prefer certain canopy levels, an observation that highlights the crucial role of species-specific habitat preferences in mosquito ecology. Following Schmalhausen’s Law, my data also showed that weather variability significantly affects mosquito species richness and abundance. These results about habitat use and responses to changing environments are key to understand how vector abundance across microhabitats might drive vector-borne pathogen transmission risk. In my second study, I observed that using dry ice (CO₂) in mosquito traps increased species richness, underscoring the need for tailored surveillance strategies to effectively target specific mosquito species. In my third study, I observed how LULC modulates mosquito species diversity and abundance and confirmed the establishment of Aedes albopictus and Ae. japonicus in Monroe County. These results could serve to predict the potential arrival of more invasive species and could be used to estimate the entomological risk of transmission for pathogens associated with the different mosquito species sampled during my dissertation.