A modest Taiwanese pig farmer might be the most prolific mass murderer in history. Huang Yu-yen’s unlucky victims? Mosquitoes. More than 4 million of them.
Collected over the course of a month, the haul was stuffed into three bulging lunch bags when Huang brought it to the scales on Sunday. Her catch weighed in at just less than 3.5 pounds, according to The Liberty Times, eclipsing her nearest rival by more than two fold in a contest organized by bug trap company Imbictus International.
The south Taiwanese woman took home a $3,000 cash prize for her efforts. She’s currently awaiting word from The Guinness Book of World Records on whether she can lay claim to the title of biggest bug killer ever.
Mosquitoes have increasingly plagued Southern China and Taiwan as human settlement and livestock reaches deeper into the insects’ natural breeding grounds. One species of roughly 17 found in Taiwan, forcipomyia taiwana, wreaks such havoc across the area that it is known as “little King Kong.” For years, the only solution to the problem was spraying pesticides such as DDT.
Huang Yu-yen may have found a cleaner alternative. She captured her 4 million bugs — more than 130,000 per day — in 10 high-tech traps placed throughout her swine pens. The traps emit low-levels of carbon dioxide and heat, replicating tasty aromas given off by animals and then trap and suffocate the bloodthirsty insects.
Trapping mosquitoes will never eradicate the pesky creatures from our living space — we live everywhere, and trillions of mosquitoes are born every year. Spraying, perhaps unfortunately, does work. Taiwan’s thorough DDT program in the ’40s and ’50s is a big reason the country is today officially Malaria-free. Still, the pitfalls of widespread pesticide use are numerous and, in some cases, well-publicized.
To get the full story on Huang Yu-yen’s fly traps, we might have to talk to the pigs.
Photo by The CDC via Wikimedia Commons.