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Comment by rendaw | Hacker News Reader

I don't entirely get this. If you have more spots with water, doesn't that just mean mosquitoes will lay more eggs? Which will then die, but +/- 0. How effective is this, actually.

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Nope, you're effectively creating a population sink. A welcoming oasis that just so happens to be a poisoned well. The trick is to put these out and carefully monitor anything else that could be alternative breeding habitat (anything that can catch water)

The population of mosquitoes isn’t increased by your bucket (assuming it kills them all) but some of them that would have laid eggs in a location that doesn’t kill them are now laying them in a location that does.

So it’ll be a reduction. How much probably depends on their other options.

I've never attempted it so I don't have any first-hand judgements of its effectiveness. However, the logic in the article seems reasonable. A backyard which already has a high population of mosquitoes implies the area has existing spots with standing water where the eggs are being hatched. Adding controlled spots of water would concentrate those eggs there and kill them off before they have a chance to hatch more eggs and add to the population. Then, the existing adults die off naturally within weeks, and you should be left with a "mosquito free yard"

No, it means they'll lay the same amount of eggs (which is the max they can produce), but a significant portion of them will be in your trap rather than somewhere they can survive. Of those that aren't in the trap, they're still subject to the same death rate they would normally be subject to

There are multiple limiting factors on mosquito egg-laying - availability of water is just one of them. The energy/nutrition required to produces eggs (which comes from blood) is also a factor, plus time, etc.

I'm sure there is some extra egg-laying, but there are also eggs laid there that would have otherwise been in suitable water.

I put Mosquito dunks in the buckets in my yard which kills the larvae, it has worked so far, no standing water plus dunks where water might pool.

If there are more mosquitoes than egg-laying spots, then yes. If there are more egg-laying spots than mosquitoes, then no.

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