Wings Adult Mosquito

The wings of mosquitoes are long and slender, and the wing veins are covered with scales. The terminology currently in use for the veins is adopted from Colless & McAlpine (1970). The principal longitudinal veins of mosquitoes (from anterior to posterior) are the costa, subcosta, radius, media, cubitus and anal vein. The branches of these veins are indicated by numbers, thus the anterior branch of the media is media-one (vein M1) and the posterior branch is media-two (vein M2). Short, usually transverse veins between two longitudinal veins are known as crossveins. In mosquitoes, the usual crossveins are the humeral crossvein between the costa and subcosta, the radiomedial crossvein between the radius and media, and the mediocubital crossvein between the media and cubitus. Areas of wing membrane delimited by veins or by veins and the wing margin are termed cells. A cell is named after the vein immediately anterior to it or after the posterior element if the vein is formed by the fusion of two vein branches, for example, cell R5 is posterior to radius-four-plus-five (vein R4+5). The cell membranes are covered with minute spicules called microtrichia (sing. microtrichium). They are especially minute in species of Uranotaenia.

The veins are clothed with scales on both the dorsal and ventral surfaces, and the apex and posterior margin of the wing bear a fringe of scales wing fringe. The scales vary considerably in size and shape on different parts of the wing. The scales are usually dark, but many species have some pale scales either intermixed or in patches. Distinct patches of pale and dark scales known as wing spots occur in most Anopheles species and species of Aedeomyia, Finlaya, Orthopodomyia, the Mimeticus Group of Culex (Culex), Orthopodomyia, Psorophora and Uranotaenia, and these play a major role in species identification. A standardised nomenclature for the wing spots of these mosquitoes was developed by Wilkerson & Peyton (1990). The alula, a small lobe located posteriorly at the base of the wing, usually bears a line of marginal or submarginal scales of different shapes or posture in various taxa, and the upper calypter, one of two lobes connecting the alula to the thorax, sometimes bears setae or hair-like scales on its margin.