Multitude of mosquitoes descends on Edmonton

They’re a bit behind schedule this year, but out city’s peskiest bug is making up for lost time.

In the last few days, more and more mosquitoes are invading city parks and backyards. The recent boost in population is due to a perfect storm by mother nature.

Typically at this time of year the majority of mosquitoes come out and bite around dawn and dusk. But this season, city entomologists are seeing a spike in the number of aggressive day biters. That basically means mosquitoes are working double duty – biting us at night and during the day.

"We have had late rains and didn’t have an awful lot of snow fall accumulation that cause of snow pools to form earlier in the spring." Biological Sciences Technician Mike Jenkins says. "It’s possible that for these mosquitoes, it’s kind of like spring and so we’re seeing spring species and summer species."

2009 saw the lowest mosquito count on record, and the low numbers were attributed to the dry weather.

So far the city has not come across any bugs carrying the West Nile virus.