I’m not a fan of mosquitoes of any kind, but there’s a warning about one in Illinois that you definitely don’t want to mess with. It’s an invasive pest that shouldn’t be here, but now it’s a reality. Be careful, they carry disease and bite like a tiger.

The Illinois Department of Public Health has set up a website dedicated to a mosquito that is worse than the usual pests native to the state. It is an invasive variant known as Asian tiger mosquito and you don’t want to become a victim of its bite.

The state of Illinois reports that the Asian tiger mosquito is one of the vectors of the West Nile virus, which has already been confirmed to be present in the Land of Lincoln.

An interesting aspect of this nasty mosquito is that you have to be careful of the females. According to the state of Illinois, the male Asian tiger mosquito does not bite, but the females do, in order to drink blood that helps develop their eggs. Yuck.

The good news is that you can prevent this invasive mosquito from becoming a nuisance. They don’t stray far from their breeding grounds, which include standing water and old tires. Make sure you don’t have any breeding grounds available, and you probably won’t have any problems.