Abstract
Historical declines in multiple insect taxa have been documented across the globe in relation to landscape-level changes in land use and climate. However, declines have either not been universally observed in all regions or examined for all species. Because mosquitoes are insects of public health importance, we analyzed a longitudinal mosquito surveillance data set from Connecticut (CT), United States (U.S.) from 2001 to 2019 to identify changes in mosquito community composition over time. We first analyzed annual site-level collections and metrics of mosquito community composition with generalized linear/additive mixed effects models; we also examined annual species-level collections using the same tools. We then examined correlations between statewide collections and weather variables as well as site-level collections and land cover classifications. We found evidence that the average trap night collection of mosquitoes has increased by ~ 60% and statewide species richness has increased by ~ 10% since 2001. Total species richness was highest in the southern portion of CT, likely due to the northward range expansion of multiple species within the Aedes, Anopheles, Culex, and Psorophora genera. How the expansion of mosquito populations in the northeast U.S. will alter mosquito-borne pathogen transmission in the region will require further investigation.
Highlights
Recent publications analyzing longitudinal data of insect populations have indicated an overall decline in insect diversity and abundance in North America and Europe in the last half c entury[1,2]
Previous studies on mosquito community structure have shown reductions in mosquito species richness and increases in the dominance of vectors of public health importance along forested to urban g radients[13], simplification of mosquito community structure in homogenized landscapes[14], changes in human risk of mosquito-borne pathogens linked to habitat disturbances[15,16], and in some instances, increased mosquito species richness was associated with increased pathogen p revalence[17,18]
The Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station (CAES) has collected and tested 4,602,240 female mosquitoes comprised of 47 species in 8 genera
Summary
Recent publications analyzing longitudinal data of insect populations have indicated an overall decline in insect diversity (predominately species richness) and abundance in North America and Europe in the last half c entury[1,2] These declines are driven by a variety of factors including changes in landscape such as increased urbanization and deforestation[1] and weather patterns, i.e., global climate change. Globalization has led to the introduction and establishment of mosquito species (and mosquito-borne pathogens) outside their evolutionary o rigins[19,20] Interventions such as mosquito control efforts to suppress malaria and yellow fever had a large and negative impact on mosquito abundance and community richness[5]; such broad-scale campaigns are no longer operable in many regions of the world and numerous mosquito populations have likely rebounded throughout much of their ranges. Overall, identifying species expansions strictly due to warming temperatures is difficult to assess as changes in climate are often coupled with factors such as land use changes and human behavior that feedback into climate change
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