House centipede, Thereuonema hilgendorfi, as a predator of mosquitoes

Abstract

Some experiments were made to evaluate the potential of house centipede, Thereuonema hilgendorfi Verhoeff, as a predator of mosquitoes. The number of footprints of the house centipede on smoked papers showed that the animal moved around actively during the nighttime, especially in the first half of the night. An exponential equation, n=N[1-exp(-a・t)], fitted well the relation between the number of mosquitoes attacked and killed by the house centipede (n) and the time in day (t). In this equation, the number of preys (mosquitoes) attacked (n) depends on 2 parameters, i.e., the initial number of the preys (N) and the attack rate of the predator (a). The number of mosquitoes attacked was compared among different densities of the predator and the prey. As a result, it was concluded that more mosquitoes were attacked at higher densities of either predator or prey, and that the house centipede attacked 0.3 to 1.3 mosquitoes per day under the average temperature of 17.5 to 25.0℃. Most of the house centipedes sampled from a cave in November were found to have eaten an average of 2.0 mosquitoes.