“Mosquito eater” is a common nickname for the crane fly, a long-legged, gangly insect that looks like an oversized mosquito. Despite the name, crane flies do not eat mosquitoes. They don’t eat anything at all. Adult crane flies drink water but have no functional mouthparts for consuming other insects. The nickname is a widespread myth that has stuck around simply because of the insect’s resemblance to a giant mosquito.
What Crane Flies Actually Are
Crane flies belong to the family Tipulidae and are found on every continent except Antarctica. They’re also called “mosquito hawks” and “skeeter eaters,” but both names are misleading. Adults are completely harmless to humans: they don’t bite, they don’t sting, and they don’t hunt mosquitoes. Their sole purpose as adults is to mate and lay eggs, which they typically accomplish within a few days before dying.
The confusion likely comes from their appearance. Crane flies have six long, spindly legs and a slender body that makes them look like a mosquito magnified several times over. When one flies into your house on a summer evening, it’s natural to assume it’s some kind of predatory mosquito relative. It isn’t. The two insects aren’t closely related, and their body plans just happen to share a superficial resemblance.
Crane Fly Larvae and Your Lawn
While adult crane flies are harmless, their larvae (called leatherjackets) can cause real damage to lawns and gardens. Leatherjackets are grayish-brown, legless grubs that live in the top layers of soil and feed on grass roots and stems. A heavy infestation turns patches of your lawn yellowish-brown as the grass dies from below. Seedlings and small plants in garden beds can also collapse when leatherjackets chew through stems at soil level.
You can confirm leatherjackets are the problem by soaking the affected area with water, covering it with black plastic overnight, and checking underneath the next morning. If leatherjackets are present, you’ll find them gathered on the surface. Birds like starlings, crows, and magpies also hunt for them, leaving small round holes in turf where they’ve poked their beaks into the soil.
For control, beneficial nematodes (microscopic worms sold commercially) can be watered into the lawn to kill the larvae. These work best when soil temperatures are at least 54°F (12°C) and the ground is moist but well-drained. Applying them preventively in September or early October targets larvae before they cause visible damage. By the time brown patches appear, soil temperatures may have dropped too low for the nematodes to be effective.
What Actually Eats Mosquitoes
If crane flies aren’t doing the job, what is? Several animals genuinely prey on mosquitoes, though none qualifies as a silver-bullet solution on its own.
Dragonflies
Dragonflies are among the most effective natural mosquito predators, both as nymphs and as adults. In lab studies, a single dragonfly nymph of one species consumed an average of 47 mosquito larvae per day. Smaller damselfly nymphs still ate around 10 to 18 larvae daily. Adult dragonflies catch mosquitoes on the wing, though their diet includes many other flying insects as well. The presence of dragonflies near a pond or wetland is a genuinely useful check on local mosquito populations.
Mosquitofish
Mosquitofish are small freshwater fish that have been deliberately introduced to ponds, ditches, and water features around the world for mosquito control. A single adult mosquitofish can eat up to 100 mosquito larvae per day, according to the University of Florida. They’re especially effective in standing water where mosquitoes breed, like rain barrels, ornamental ponds, and unused swimming pools.
Bats
Bats eat mosquitoes, but their reputation as mosquito-destroying machines is somewhat overstated. Research analyzing bat droppings found that mosquito consumption varied dramatically by species and body size. Among five bat species studied, only the two smallest (each weighing around 4 to 4.5 grams) regularly ate mosquitoes. Even then, the most frequent consumer had mosquito DNA in just 55% of individuals sampled. Moths and other larger insects made up the bulk of most bats’ diets. Bats are helpful, but they aren’t specifically targeting mosquitoes the way their marketing on “bat house” packaging might suggest.
Controlling Mosquitoes Around Your Home
Since no single predator will eliminate mosquitoes from your yard, the most effective approach targets mosquitoes where they breed: standing water. Mosquito larvae need still or slow-moving water to develop, and eliminating even small sources (plant saucers, clogged gutters, old tires, birdbaths that aren’t refreshed) can dramatically reduce the local population.
For water features you can’t drain, larvicide products containing a naturally occurring soil bacterium called Bti are highly effective. Bti produces proteins that are toxic specifically to mosquito larvae when ingested. Lab studies have shown lethality rates above 96% against mosquito larvae, and field applications have maintained effective control for months at a time. Bti comes in pellet, dunk, and liquid forms that can be added to ponds, rain barrels, and other standing water. It’s harmless to fish, pets, and humans, making it one of the safest mosquito control tools available.
Combining habitat reduction with Bti and encouraging natural predators like dragonflies and mosquitofish gives you far more mosquito control than any number of crane flies bumping into your porch light ever could.