During the summer 1994 outbreak of epidemic polyarthritis in suburban Brisbane, 29,931 adult female mosquitoes were collected by octenol-CO2 light traps and tested for virus by species in pools of approximately 20 using an in situ enzyme-linked immunoassay. Overall, 63 isolations of Ross River (RR) virus were made from 7 different mosquito species, including 23 from freshwater-breeding Culex annulirostris Skuse, 13 from peridomestic Aedes notoscriptus (Skuse), 4 from Aedes procax (Skuse), 12 from the brackish water-breeding Aedes funereus (Theobald), 9 from saltmarsh Aedes vigilax (Skuse), and 1 each from Culex sitiens Wiedemann and Aedes alternans (Westwood). The RR virus minimum infection rate in mosquitoes ranged from 1.6 to 2.5/1,000 from March to June 1994. This study implicates freshwater and brackish water mosquitoes as important suburban vectors of RR virus and indicates the need for refocusing mosquito control priorities.

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Equipment and methods for the collection, handling and sorting of Ceratopogonidae for virus isolation are described. The desirability of processing living females of suitable physiological age is emphasized and the need for flexibility in the use of collection methods is discussed. The same procedures have been successfully applied to Phlebotomus and Simuliidae.