Study Finds Mosquitos Attracted by Certain Colors

You probably know that mosquitoes are primarily attracted to the carbon dioxide we exhale. Or if you didn’t know that, well, that’s why the little buggers follow you around. We can’t smell it, but they can, as you sit there at camp, exhaling, basically emitting the mosquito version of the smell of delicious fresh-baked bread all over the place.

But, new research shows, there’s a second-level attractor that might be what prompts the mosquito to bite you: specific colors, according to a report by AdventureJournal.com.

Scientists at the University of Washington collected a bunch of female mosquitos (males don’t bite) and put them in a container. When they pumped in a little carbon dioxide, the mosquitos got out little tiny bibs and knives and forks and looked around for food. Scientists then put little dots of color in with the mosquitos to see how they reacted. If the dot was blue, green, purple, or white, colors that have short wavelengths, the mosquitos ignored them.

But colors with longer wavelengths, red, black, orange, for example, were like ringing a dinner bell.

Click here to read the full report by AdventureJournal.com.