J. of Advanced Botany and Zoology Volume 7 / Issue 2 ISSN: 2348 – 7313 1 JOURNAL OF ADVANCED BOTANY AND ZOOLOGY Journal homepage: http://scienceq.org/Journals/JABZ.php Research Article Open Access The Use of Indigenous Plant in Controlling Mosquito (Agent of Infectious Disease) Muhammad, A. A. * , Sambo, S. and Tambari, U. Department of Biology, Shehu Shagari College of Education, Sokoto, Nigeria *Corresponding author: Muhammad Armiya’u Aminu, Phone: + 234 (0)8132550545, E-mail: armeeya@gmail.com Received: January25, 2019, Accepted: March 01, 2019, Published: March 01, 2019. ABSTRACT The use of botanicals as alternatives to synthetic insecticides offers a more environmentally friendly method of insect control. The current study evaluated effects of two indigenous plants against Anopheles mosquito. Two plants namely neem tree (Azadirachtaindica) and Water hyacinth (Echorniacrassipes) were used to control mosquito biologically those were obtained from Gwiwa Low cost and Tashar Illela (at Maimasukka River) Sokoto, Nigeria respectively, various concentrations of the plants were prepared and used. Mortality (of dead larva) were recorded against the various concentrations, each plant was tested against anopheles effectiveness. For water hyacinth the highest percentage mortality was 86.6% at 15μg/L and 120μg/L the lowest percentage mortality was 73.3% at 30μg/L. While for Neem the highest percentage mortality was 100% at 120μg/L and lowest was 36.6% at 15μg/L. The government should encourage, empower and establish research institutes, give financial support for further research into the bioactivity of these plants to be able to formulate insecticidal coils that can be used to repel and prevent mosquito bites, which may eventually reduce the use of synthetic insecticides. Keyword: Neem tree, Water hyacinth, Botanicals, Mosquito and Indigenous. . INTRODUCTION Mosquitoes are vectors of various diseases most notably, malaria. A vector is any agents that carries and transmit an infectious path agent into another living organism mosquito are responsible for transmission of parasitic and viral infection to millions of people worldwide with substantial morbidity and mortality [1]. Mosquitoes are considered one of the most dangerous creatures on the planet because of their ability to spread deadly diseases. The US centers for diseases control reported that the insect kill more than one million people a year just through the transmission of malaria, add to that is the numbers of those sickened and killed by other mosquito-borne disease such as dengue fever, yellow fever and West Nile Viries (WNV) is enough to see how mosquito earned their dangerous reputation [2]. Mosquitoes belong to the class insecta order diptera and family culicidae the two subfamilies are anopheline which include the genera aedes, culex, mansonia and magoguos [3]. Although a few species of mosquitoes are harmless or even useful to humanity, most are considered a nuisance because they consume blood from living vertebrates include human. The females of many species of mosquitos are blood eating pest; in feeding of blood some of them transmit extremely harmful livestock diseases, such as malaria, yellow fever and filariasis. Malaria and lymphatic filariasis (Lf) are two most important vector-borne parasitic diseases worldwide, in Africa; Nigeria has the largest burden of malaria and lymphatic filariasis [4]. Almost all tropical regions of the world are experiencing the resurgence and reoccurrence of the world’s most deadly diseases i.e malaria, filariasis, dengue and chukungunya fever [5] and Nigeria is no exception. Malaria caused by parasites primarily plasmodium falcifarum or p.vivax is transmitted when female anopheles mosquitoes pick up the parasite by feeding on infected blood of humans the parasite develops in the mosquito for 10 – 18 days, then is passed on to another human when mosquito injects saliva while feeding, the parasite migrate to liver, then to the blood stream (in red blood cells) the infected person begin to show symptoms such as fever, chills, sweating, headaches and other flu-like condition leading to even more severe case sometimes, e.g kidney failure and death especially if left untreated. Dengue fever is also spread by aedes mosquito which is able to transmit the disease (Dengue) about a week after biting on infected person the virus multiply in the blood stream severe cases could lead to bruising and bleeding as a result, of dengue hemorrhagic fever. Similarly the West Nile Virus (WNV) is also transmitted by culex mosquitoes by feeding on infected birds after spreading through the mosquito systems, it pass into human through their saliva during feeding, the (WNV) multiplies in the human bloodstream and is carried to brain where it begin to affect the central nervous system and cause inflation of brain tissue (encephalitis) the infection can lead to convulsion, coma and death, even if the person survives, there is a good chance of permanent neurological damage. Other disease transmitted by mosquito includes yellow fever transmitted by Aedesaegypti and Chikungunya fever also transmitted by Aedesaegypti and Aedesalbopictus [5]. Mosquito control in view of their medical importance assumes global importance. In the context of ever increasing trend to use more powerful synthetic insecticides to achieve immediate results in the control of mosquitoes, an alarming increase of physiological resistance in the vectors, its increased toxicity to non-target organisms and high cost are not worthy [6]. Muriu et al., Raj et al., and Ashley et al., [7, 8, 9] also stated that most the synthetics chemicals are expensive and destructive to the environment and also toxic to humans and animals; therefore alternative vector control strategies especially effective and low cost are extremely imperatives. Hence innovative vector control strategies like use of photochemical as an alternative sources of insecticidal/larvicidal agents in the fight against vector born-disease has become inevitable; above and beyond in recent epoch around the globe photochemical have gain massive attention by various researchers because of their biodegradable and eco-friendly values [10]. This