Hi everyone,

Thank you so much for all the effort! We are now at > 375 observations! I would like to take the time to recognize four volunteers who continue to work very hard to make this project a success:

First in the Waimea area @lynnbeittel has been amazing at networking, getting publicity for the project, finding and recruiting volunteers and collecting lots of data! Not to be outdone, she is joined by her partner in all this @waimeamiddleschool who pioneered our best photo techniques and continues to work to get all ages involved. Thanks @lynnbeittel & @waimeamiddleschool!

On the Kalapana side of the island @vaneden has rallied many folks to make mosquito traps and fight dengue during the outbreak and continues to collect many observations! I recently visited @vaneden and we had a fantastic time finding not so fantastic mosquitoes in his area. @vaneden has also pioneered many new capture techniques, like the use of readily available sticky paper on our rear-out traps in addition to teaching people how to create lethal ovitraps from off-the-shelf materials. Thanks @vaneden!

In Oahu, @ychan has worked with high-school science students for over a year, testing out new methods and helping students such as @annafreitas (class of 2016) do an independent study of mosquitoes in Oahu. She is now working with a larger group of teachers to try to get many more kids involved this school year. Thanks @ychan!

These four volunteers are being promoted to project managers, and you'll be hearing from them more here as we add more materials to the project site.

Thanks again!

@cydno (Durrell)

PS. NO BETTER TIME TO GET OUT AND LOOK FOR MOSQUITOES!

As we enter the fall season, when mosquito abundances can rise with changes in the rains, I would like to reiterate the need to keep our eyes and ears (!) out for mosquitoes and mosquito habitat. Dengue and Zika are not being actively transmitted on the islands so there is no better time to take care of mosquitoes in your neighborhood than now. If you haven't added a record, helped ID mosquitoes (see our backlog here: Mosquitoes to identify) or looked around your neighborhood and community to help reduce mosquito habitat now is the time!

As always, use proper precautions in the field including sturdy shoes, long pants and long-sleeved shirts and repellent and of course if you do have a problem with mosquitoes or any other vector or pest, please contact the local authorities, in Hawaii all the information can be found here:

mosquito-borne-diseases

And useful information on cleaning mosquito breeding sites can be found here:

Fight-the-Bite-Hawai'i

Stay safe!

@cydno

Aloha Everyone,

The "Mosquitoes in Hawaii" Project has passed 380 observations and we continue to look for more volunteers throughout the state. Have you been lurking on this site and suddenly feel the urge to get involved? The time commitment can be as low or as high as you want. On Hawaii Island we have active volunteers in Waimea and Puna. We could use some more observers in Ka'u, South Kona, Kailua Kona, Hawi, Hilo and the Hamakua Coast. If you are interested, one of us will help train you. This is important scientific research that will help map the presence of mosquito species in Hawaii, especially Aedes mosquitoes that can spread Zika, Dengue and other diseases. We are particularly interested in recruiting high school students to help. It would make a great science project and look good on a college application form. The research from this project is slated to be included in a published scientific paper.

Recently I discovered a very good CBC (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation) documentary about mosquitoes on YouTube. It’s from the series “The Nature of Things” and it’s called “Zapped The Buzz About Mosquitoes.” It’s worth 45 minutes of your time. Mosquitoes are fascinating little buggahs. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i7uK61JguDU

Last June some of the members of our group were featured in this article about the “Mosquitoes in Hawaii” project: http://hawaiitribune-herald.com/news/local-news/crowdsourcing-projects-put-everyday-folks-role-mosquito-research-scientists

One last thought, we welcome everyone involved to comment on observations. After all, iNaturalist is a social media platform. I am not a scientist or naturalist by training, far from it, but I’ve learned to identify a few mosquitoes. I often confirm IDs on other people’s observations and sometimes post a simple comment complimenting the photo. It’s encouraging to get feedback from our little community of “Mosquito Nerds.”

Mahalo for all you do,
Lynn

Hi iNat Mosquitoes in Hawaii contributors,

As we approach 400 observations (!) it is a good time to review what makes a good observation and how to ensure as a community that the database of mosquitoes in Hawai'i has the highest quality possible.

First a quick review, to be useful, an observation will have several characteristics: a known user will gather evidence (usually photographic) of the presence of a particular species at a particular location at a known data and time.

This is summarized as the who, what, where & when of an observation. See:

http://www.inaturalist.org/pages/getting+started#what

With all of these attributes the observation becomes 'verifiable', and if more than two observers (of three if three have commented agree on an identification) agree then it becomes 'research grade'! For more information see:

http://www.inaturalist.org/pages/help#quality

We could really use the community to work to identify and comment on each other's observations. This can be handled from almost any way an observation is displayed on the site, but the most efficient way to do this is to follow this link to the interactive view and find the observations that need identification and get them filtered by the locale and taxon (in this case mosquitoes).

Here are the steps and the final result, first the general way:

1) Click on the "Observations" drop down menu
2) Select "Identify"
3) Select under the word Identify the box that says "Species" & type in "Mosquitoes" or the family name "Culicidae" then select this choice
4) Clear the next box over "Place" and type in Hawaii, selecting "Hawaii, US State" in the pop up
5) Click on the filter, and select the check-boxes "Verifiable" (have a date, time, location and at least one photo) and "Needs ID" (not yet considered research grade).
6) You will get an interactive list of records and the url at the top of your browser window will say this:

http://www.inaturalist.org/observations/identify?taxon_id=52134&place_id=11

You could alternatively follow 1 & 2 and then change step three to "click on the filter" and then following step 5 and also expanding the selection for "More filters" and typing the project name "Mosquitoes in Hawaii" leading to this browser string:

http://www.inaturalist.org/observations/identify?reviewed=true&taxon_id=52134&project_id=4357&place_id=any

It is a lot of fun to identify records, furthermore, if you 'unclick' verifiable you may find some records that are oddly not considered "research grade" even though two or more people agree on the identification. These records might either be missing the date & time &/or location. You can direct message the iNat user to remind them to fix a record missing these key components and then the record can become 'Research Grade."

Note, the database also keeps track of records you have reviewed, so for instance if you are not happy to give something a species ID but you don't want to continually look at a particular record in this interactive mode then un-clicking reviewed will show you only new records you haven't reviewed!

Please use the comment box to ask any questions if this write-up needs to be clarified!

Have fun identifying mosquitoes!

All the best,

@cydno
(Durrell)

Nets are effective at catching mosquitoes but removing them from the net and taking a photo is clumsy and slow. An aspirator makes it easier – it’s a tube used to suck the insect from the net into a small plastic sample jar. With some practice, the jar can be removed from the aspirator and capped without losing the insect.

Once the mosquito is in the jar, it's hard to get a clear photo since they won't sit still. You can freeze the jar to kill the mosquito. Usually that causes it to curl up, and it will typically lie on its side or back, making it hard to get a photo of the key ID features on the back.

Instead, get some transparent sticky sided plastic used to catch insect pests. (e.g. Black Flag 11018 Window Fly Trap). Cut a piece 3 cm x 4 - 6 cm and slip it inside the jar with the sticky face inwards and the long edge going around the inner circumference of the jar. Then, when you aspirate a mosquito into the jar it will quickly land on the sticky plastic. You can catch many insects at once before stopping to take photos so it saves a lot of time.

In fact, using this method, you don't need to bother with an aspirator. Just trap the mosquito in a small part of the net, and then take a plastic jar containing the sticky plastic, and slide it up inside the net until the opening is in the small part of the net where the mosquito is. With a little nudging it will fly inside. In a few moments it will stick to the sticky and you can take it out and cap the jar. You can catch several like this - you can take the cap off and they won't escape.

Most insects stick in an upright position as if they had carefully landed and are perfectly positioned for a photograph. You don’t need to kill them – just take out the plastic, lay it on a gray surface, and take photos. It makes it easy to do in the field. This works so well that I was able to use my phone to photograph five mosquitoes at once, without using a macro lens, and identify them all from that one photo. See: http://www.inaturalist.org/observations/4083377.

Van