Re: Do mosquito hawks make a noise? If so what does it sound like?

Hi Ryley:

Mosquitos do have hearing, though it is fairly specific. I remember my entomology professor telling me about an engineer who was working on an electric generator, who had problems with mosquitoes swarming around the generator - it turns out that those were all male mosquitoes, and the generator just happened to be working at the same frequency as a female mosquito beats its wings. Other sounds appear to have no effect, for instance there are numerous types of ultrasonic mosquito "repellers" on the market, but when tested, none appear to work (more here, with the original references).

What I know as a "mosquito hawk" are the Crane Flies (family Tipulidae), who look like very large mosquitoes themselves. It turns out that they are not predators (so their name is a misnomer, so it is unlikely that mosquitoes would need to avoid them.

That would also be a tough experiment to do, you'd need some fairly specialized audio equipment to do it.

Hope that helps,
Rob Campbell, MAD Scientist