Bromeliads and Mosquitos

Dypsisdean

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28/09/07
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I have heard it both ways - mosquitos will breed in bromeliads, and mosquitos do not breed in bromeliads. Does anyone know for sure?

If mosquitos breed in palms and bananas, in the area where the leaf attaches to the trunk, why wouldn't they breed in bromeliads?

I'm guessing the answer, as these things usually go, is not a simple yes or no. There are many types of mosquitos. And just because you don't see the larvae swimming around in the water, this isn't a surefire way to say they don't bred there.

But, does anyone really know the answer to this question?

Apparently the Zika outbreak in Florida is being blamed by some on Bromeliads.
http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/zi...bred-bromeliads-florida-officials-say-n641726
 
I grow a ton of bromeliads and I've never seen mosquito larva in any of them - and I've looked. I'm in Houston, TX - mosquito lava will grow in as little water as what can collect in discarded plastic bottle caps. But for some reason they stay out of my bromeliads (or at least they seem to have so far). I think it's certainly possible for this to be an issue, but it strikes as being more just the latest bandwagon those in charge are jumping on so that they can look like they're doing something. I'm willing to bet that once they ripped out all of those bromeliads they still had a pretty big mosquito problem because they were more worried about the image they were portraying than actually solving the problem.
 
I have also not found any larva in my Bromeliads and I checked them this summer and now regularly.
I was going to link a article, but it looks like it is no longer found. Here is a quick shot of the opening page of the article.
pizap.com14783455293591.jpg
 
I had lots of little brown mosquitos here at my nursery. The solution is quite simple. BTI is a harmless bacteria you can treat you plants with once a month and it prevents the larvae from growing. It's the same as mosquito dunks, but I buy it in grain form in 50lb bags.

ALso treating with spinosad will wipe mosquitoes out pretty quick. It also kills scale, mealy bug and the evil weevil.
 
Hi everyone - I have seen the odd mosquito larvae in the cups of my neoregelias but never in large numbers. The fact that I never use insecticides so consequently small birds, frogs and lizards are often seen around the cups of my Neoregelias and are probably keeping the numbers under control.

There have been several informative articles written regarding mosquitoes and bromeliads and here are the links to two interesting ones.

http://www.fcbs.org/articles/mosquito.htm

http://bsnz.org/articles/47-mosquitoes

All the best, Nev.
 
Aedes mosquitoes (zika carrying species) do not frequently breed in bromeliads. They need a larger area. Bromeliads can host smaller types of non-disease carrying mosquitoes.
 
I have heard it both ways - mosquitos will breed in bromeliads, and mosquitos do not breed in bromeliads. Does anyone know for sure?

If mosquitos breed in palms and bananas, in the area where the leaf attaches to the trunk, why wouldn't they breed in bromeliads?

I'm guessing the answer, as these things usually go, is not a simple yes or no. There are many types of mosquitos. And just because you don't see the larvae swimming around in the water, this isn't a surefire way to say they don't bred there.

But, does anyone really know the answer to this question?

Apparently the Zika outbreak in Florida is being blamed by some on Bromeliads.
http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/zi...bred-bromeliads-florida-officials-say-n641726
On one of my visits to Pauleen's place in Hawaii we visited a garden not too far away that had many hundreds of bromeliads and we got munched by mosquitoes... Pauleen showed me some larger bromeliads with larvae in them. The main reason she refused to grow bromeliads on her property was specifically for this reason, and sure enough, her place had NO mosquitoes.
 
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