Key West mosquito control could go sci-fi (good or bad?)

[ensho]

http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/11/11/2498023/key-west-mosquito-control-could.html


Key West could be the test-ground for a new and controversial form of mosquito control – genetically modified swarms carrying an “autocidal’’ gene


-snip-

Now, the Florida Keys Mosquito Control District and a British biotech company called Oxitec are poised to push the science into the largely uncharted, highly controversial waters of genetic engineering.

The plan is to release squadrons of genetically modified male mosquitoes in a section of Key West that is a haven for Aedes aegypti, the pesky yard-dwelling variety that can spread dengue fever. The hope of the test run, which would be a first in the United States, is that lab-bred bugs will mate with wild females and pass on a defect built into their DNA — an “autocidal’’ gene — that kills offspring.

-snip-

In research published last month, the company reported eye-opening success from a 2009 trial that released 3.3 million mosquitoes in the Cayman Islands and reduced the native population in the target zone by 80 percent. Oxitec, a small firm created by Oxford University researchers, has launched two tests this year in Malaysia and Brazil and, for more than a year, has been quietly seeking permission to test in Key West.

-snip-

The district hopes to begin a field test somewhere in the Old Town section of Key West as early as January. But the experiment, already pushed back for months, could face more delay. For starters, the existing net of rules isn’t set up to handle transgenic mosquitoes.
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I want to say no....

question: if the mosquitos are mostly all killed in an area, what happens to the species that eat them for food? do they die of starvation?

[piratefish08]

1. what could possibly go wrong?

:shrug:

[greytdemocrat]

2. Yeah...

This just sounds too creepy. Just buy some Off.

[TheWraith]

12. You have any idea how nasty that stuff actually is?

Very.

[slackmaster]

3. I'd rather see them use alligators with computer-controlled laser beams...

...on their fucking heads.

[dtexdem]

11. That is totally unorthodox -- it should be sharks, not gators!

;-)

[NV Whino]

4. Seems to me they've already done this with the fruit fly

They made one of the genders sterile so mating would produce no offspring. Hell of a lot better than spraying pesticides from helicopters.

[saras]

5. The interesting part comes after the gene crosses species barriers - where TO? Who knows?

We get to find THAT out afterwards, maybe decades afterwards.

[TheWraith]

13. Because genes just leap unrelated species all the time?

That's why you're part apple tree.

[pipi_k]

6. Every time I hear where humans

are thinking of messing with the ecology, I cringe.

We are too stupid and arrogant, not to mention short-sighted, to play God in most cases.

I don't know what they have for mosquito-eating creatures down there, but I can say that if the same thing were done in my area, that would probably be the near-end of bats.

We used to be inundated every summer with mosquitoes. It was impossible to go outside unless there was a breeze. They were sneaking into the house and roosting at the top of the raised ceilings.

It really was awful until we put up bat houses.

Now there's a few days of mosquito-fest before they virtually disappear because the bats eat them.

I got ONE bite this past summer, where it used to be dozens before the bat house.

so anyway, people seriously ask the question, what is the purpose of mosquitoes...

well, duh. Obviously, they exist to be food for other creatures.

We need to stop playing God.

[ensho]

7. Key West has bats, I watch them around the street light by my

2nd floor apt... not a lot, one or two, some nights, none

[pipi_k]

9. Cool...

bats, I mean.

I have three bat houses in the yard. It's always a big thrill in the springtime to see the accumulating piles of bat poo under them. It means the colony didn't die (from that white-nose fungus) and they're back for another year.

:)

[DainBramaged]

8. I think of the cane toad as a successful experiment in getting rid of pests

NOT

[dtexdem]

10. This needs evaluation by an objective team, not controlled by the interests involved.

But as to the last question: what happens to species that thrive on the corpses of humans killed by mosquito-borne illnesses? Hmm, I'll try to summon up a crocodile tear.