Blood feeding and autogeny in the peridomestic mosquito Aedes bahamensis (Diptera: Culicidae)

Under laboratory conditions, most colony and field-collected Aedes bahamensis Berlin females developed eggs autogenously when they had access to sugar. However, significantly fewer starved females were autogenous, and they produced smaller egg clutches. Autogenous fecundity covaried with wing length, and smaller females generally failed to express autogeny. Mating had no effect on the maturation of the initial egg clutch. Most starved, nulliparous females blood fed from a restrained host. At a south Florida field site, both parous and nulliparous Ae. bahamensis were captured with a power aspirator, but concurrent sampling with dry ice-baited, light traps collected only parous females. Host-seeking females, taken either in chicken-baited traps or as they attempted to blood feed on humans, were also parous, with a single exception. Thus, at this field site, Ae. bahamensis females normally delayed blood feeding until after their first oviposition. Whether or not Ae. bahamensis females in other south Florida populations show a similar gonotrophic pattern probably will depend upon the availability of sugar sources and conditions in the mosquito's aquatic habitat that affect adult size.