White-footed woods mosquito
Psorophora ferox
The white-footed woods mosquito is a dark mosquito with white tips on its legs, as if it wears little white socks. Its back shines purple.
Lives in
Eastern United States and southeastern Canada, south through Mexico, Central and South America and the Caribbean, in wet woods
Can it hurt you?
Dangerous: look, do not touch
Its bites hurt and it can carry some diseases. Wear long sleeves and bug spray in wet woods, do not let it bite you, and tell a grown-up if you get many bites.
What does it eat?
The girls drink blood from people and animals. Their babies live in rain puddles and eat tiny bits in the water.
How fast is it?
A tortoise about 0.3 km/h (0.19 mph)
White-footed woods mosquito about 2 km/h (1.2 mph)
A person walking about 5 km/h (3.1 mph)
A kid running fast about 13 km/h (8.1 mph)
cool stuff
Fun facts
1
Its eggs are laid where rain puddles form, and the babies grow in the water in summer.
2
In Central and South America it can carry the eggs of the human bot fly to people.
3
Each wing of a girl is only about 4 millimetres long.
you asked
Most asked questions about White-footed woods mosquito
?Where does the white-footed woods mosquito live?
In wet woods from the eastern United States and Canada down to South America.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Psorophora ferox
- Group
- Flies and mosquitoes
- Family
- Culicidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Diptera > Culicidae
- Lives on
- North America, South America
Where the facts come from
- Psorophora ferox (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
- Picture by Katja Schulz. CC BY 2.0, Wikimedia Commons. The sticker of this bug is drawn from this picture.
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