Several trapping techniques have been deployed in sampling malaria vectors population in the world [
1‐
3]. Human landing catch has been considered as the gold standard method in mosquito sampling for surveillances and control programmes to estimate the infectivity rates, species abundance and mosquitoes dynamics [
4]. With the increase of ethical issues in using humans as subject in collection of disease vectors, alternative simple methods, such as odour-baited traps, need to be developed and evaluated for their effectiveness [
5]. Host odours provide olfactory cues by which haematophagous insects locate host for their blood meal [
6]. Mosquitoes are the most important disease vectors in sub-Saharan Africa [
7]. Odour-baited traps have shown to be effective to different disease vectors in tropical areas, including tsetse flies [
8,
9], mosquitoes [
10] and ticks [
11]. Several studies have shown the attractiveness of malaria vectors to different hosts [
12,
13]. In the
Anopheles gambiae complex, studies have shown different odour preference among the sibling species:
Anopheles gambiae s.s. is attracted by semiochemicals from humans sweat [
14],
Anopheles arabiensis notably varies from being attracted by humans or bovine odour, depending on the geographical location [
15]. In several arid parts of sub-Saharan Africa,
An. arabiensis, is a major malaria vector [
16].
Anopheles arabiensis is regarded as more exophilic than other sibling species of the
An. gambiae complex [
15]. Several trapping tools, baited with odour, have shown great efficiency when evaluated for mosquitoes sampling in different areas, such as the mosquito magnet
®[
17] and the MMX-trap [
10]. In rural areas, there is a need to develop a trapping system, which uses the host-seeking strategies of the vectors and can be incorporated in simple tools/devices for vectors sampling [
18,
19]. The exploitation of both ecology and behavioural aspects of vectors are important in reducing the vector-human contact by developing targets or odour-based sampling tool [
8,
19].
The purpose of this paper was to report the findings of evaluating resting boxes baited with cow odour against human landing catch in irrigation schemes of lower Moshi, northern Tanzania.