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A Benefit To Cold Weather: Slower Mosquito Growth

CHICAGO (CBS) -- The cool, wet weather this spring has provided plenty of breeding grounds for mosquitoes, but it hasn't been warm enough for them to really start biting.

After another somewhat soggy weekend, mosquitos have plenty of places to lay and hatch their eggs.

"Anywhere where standing water can stand for three days or so in your yard – whether it be a tire, or an empty bucket," George Balis, an entomologist for Clarke mosquito control.

Balis said the silver lining to those rain clouds is that it has been too cold for mosquitoes to quickly grow into biting adults.

"In the summer it will usually take 5 to 10 days. In these situations, it might be two weeks or longer for those mosquitoes to develop into adults," he said.

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Balis said, in a typical spring, biting adult mosquitoes typically surface around Memorial Day, but this year, it will likely happen later.

"Mosquitoes in general do not like to fly when temperatures start to drop below 55 degrees," he said.

Balis encouraged people to eliminate standing water after it rains to get rid of potential breeding grounds for mosquitoes. Even something as small as a bottle cap of water left standing for more than a week is enough for mosquito eggs to develop into adults.

The types of mosquito that carry the Zika virus typically are not found in Chicago. In the U.S., it is most commonly found in the Deep South, and along the Atlantic Coast and the Mexican border.

However, Balis said all the recent attention on Zika can be channeled into preventing the mosquito-borne West Nile virus, which is still a very real threat.

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