In the past decade, two pathogens transmitted by Culicoides biting midges (Diptera: Ceratopogonidae), bluetongue virus and Schmallenberg virus, have caused serious economic losses to the European livestock industry, most notably affecting sheep and cattle. These outbreaks of arboviral disease have highlighted large knowledge gaps on the biology and ecology of indigenous Culicoides species. With...

Two experiments were conducted to test application of ULV naled against adult Aedes taeniorhynchus and Culicoides furens exposed simultaneously in cages hung on poles at selected heights and distances from the spray source. ULV spray was released at 0.14 oz active ingredient/acre, droplet size 13.5 micron mmd. In both experiments, insecticide largely carried over the first poles. The greatest m...

Bluetongue virus (BTV) infects sheep, cattle and other ruminants and is transmitted by Culicoides spp. of biting midges. Virus is typically isolated and characterized by infection of susceptible vertebrate cells that undergo detectable and measurable cytopathic effects. Cell lines derived from C. sonorensis may be useful for virus isolation and studies to better understand BTV replication in th...

In the past decade, two pathogens transmitted by Culicoides biting midges (Diptera: Ceratopogonidae), bluetongue virus and Schmallenberg virus, have caused serious economic losses to the European livestock industry, most notably affecting sheep and cattle. These outbreaks of arboviral disease have highlighted large knowledge gaps on the biology and ecology of indigenous Culicoides species. With...

There is increasing interest in the heritable bacteria of invertebrate vectors of disease as they present novel targets for control initiatives. Previous studies on biting midges (Culicoides spp.), known to transmit several RNA viruses of veterinary importance, have revealed infections with the endosymbiotic bacteria, Wolbachia and Cardinium. However, rickettsial symbionts in these vectors are ...

A total of 33,564 Culicoides midges was collected in 44 light trap collections made at 22 sites in the Stellenbosch area during November 1986. Of the 23 species present in these collections 8 were frequently encountered namely, C. magnus, C. imicola, Culicoides sp. 49, C. zuluensis, C. gulbenkiani, C. pycnostictus, C. distinctipennis and C. nivosus. Although C. magnus was abundant at all trap s...

Analyses of 2 light trap catches comprising 6,041 and 1,598 Culicoides showed that the reliability of subsampling such catches increased with subsample size, while the subsampling error decreased with an increase in the number of individuals per species present in a subsample. Subsamples comprising approximately 500 Culicoides are deemed sufficient for comparing population densities between sit...