On September 19, 1899, there was an update in the Truro Newspaper: Karl is 35 miles West of Moose Jaw. The next town that he expected to reach was Medicine Hat, then 230 miles distant. He is expected to spend Sunday at Medicine Hat. The road he would have to travel from Moose Jaw to Medicine Hat is overgrown with cactus and spear grass. There is no habitation excepting the usual railway section horses and for companions mosquitoes at the rate of 10,000 per cubic foot. Mail sent at once to Rossland B.C will catch him there.
I’m pretty confident there have never been swarms of mosquitoes at a rate of 10,000 per cubic foot. Yet, as a mosquito magnet myself, I can imagine or have proclaimed a similar statistic amid mosquito season, usually while I’m on the golf course!
Mosquitoe, or Culicidae — its scientific name — is a winged insect with an average life span of between 2 weeks and 6 months. Only the female mosquito sucks blood which they use to nourish their eggs. They track down their ‘prey’ — animals and humans — through body odours (both good and bad) and exhaled carbon dioxide. I’ve been convinced that I’m an all you can eat buffet bar for mosquitos due to my daily banana intake. Old wives tale? No. Unfortunately, the lactic acid released from the body after consuming potassium-rich foods off-gasses and acts as a calling card to the swarms of mozzies.
Let’s be honest, dear reader; the mosquito is one of those creatures for which there is little positive regard. Sure, it is a great food source for birds, frogs and bats, but for humans, it’s a nuisance at best and, at worst, a conduit for severe disease.
There are over 3,000 species of mosquitos, but would you believe only three that are responsible for spreading disease: Anopheles, Culex, and Aedes. These mosquito species can carry malaria, elephantiasis, encephalitis, filariasis, yellow fever, dengue and West Nile virus. These carnivores cause millions of deaths annually.
In 1899 travelling through Moosejaw, Karl didn’t need to worry about disease-carrying mosquitoes, but as he travelled to other continents, the risks would be more prevalent, especially for malaria*. This risk is equally true for me when I travel abroad. Notwithstanding the advent of insect-repellent, as a result of global warming, there are now even more countries where the three dangerous species of mosquitoes can be found.
Historically, the disease-carrying species have been localized to developing countries associated with hot, drought conditions and stagnating streams and standing water, an environment offering prime breeding conditions. But climate change has impacted the number and range of the disease spreading mosquitoes. We’ve seen it here in North America when West Nile — a virus spread by a mosquito after it bites an infected bird — first identified in 1999 in New York, is now an annual concern, with increased cases and deaths.
The 10,000 mosquitoes that accompanied Karl while biking through Moosejaw, Saskatchewan is roughly the same amount that accompany me when I play golf. Fortunately for both of us — with the exception now of potential West Nile virus — they are generally of the nuisance species, resulting in itchy, swollen lumps. But for my future travels, over 120 years after Karl’s there are increased risks of transmission of disease from those pesky mosquitos. As I start to plan my upcoming trip to India and Sri Lanka I will be updating my first aid kit referenced in Karl Chronicles post #56 and start to consider the medley of vaccinations and antibiotics needed to stay safe, and maybe, just maybe, I’ll start to decrease my consumption of bananas.
*The Anepheline mosquitoes can carry Malaria, which infects over 200 million people annually of which there are 400,000 deaths every year.
Footnote: I was travelling through Moosejaw in early October and have to admit that mosquitoes were not an issue for me. I was also pleased that unlike Karl, I did in fact see a moose and not just any moose but Mac the Moose. Mac is the world's largest moose at 10.36 metres (34.0 ft) tall and weighing 10,000 kg
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