Angela Stroud, age 70, of Tulsa, Okla.,for her question:

 

WHAT IS A MOSQUITO'S LIFE SPAN?

A mosquito's life cycle progresses through four stages. The one we know best is the winged adult. The one that bites us is the female. The adult male mosquito feeds on plant juices. This stage of his life usually lasts from 10 to 20 days. The adult female may live more than a month  while she lays perhaps 3,000 eggs in small batches of 100 to 300.

The younger mosquito goes through an egg, larva and pupa stage  and all these stages need moisture. When water is plentiful, the egg may hatch in a few days.  The wriggly larva lasts from four to 10 days, and after three or four days the pupa is ready to hatch into a winged adult. In this case, the mosquito life story is finished in four to six weeks. However, when ponds dry up, the egg stage can last until the rains return, which may be a year or more.