Yet Another Cycling Forum

Random Musings => Miscellany => Where The Wild Things Are => Topic started by: Wowbagger on 30 July, 2010, 02:21:10 pm

Title: Bloody leg-chomping little gits!
Post by: Wowbagger on 30 July, 2010, 02:21:10 pm
Our tai chi instructor is quite keen on a bit of outdoors tai chi in the summer. The trouble is, there's a load of nasty biting insects out there and they got me good and proper last night.

They are not mosquitoes but some other little bugger that flies in and then proceeds to chew its way through your skin rather than pierce you with a proboscis. They look a little bit like ladybird larvae - but of course they can't be as ladybird larvae can't fly and only east greenfly anyway. I would imagine they are some sort of midge, but are rather larger than the well-known Scottish beastie.

They are also pretty slow escaping a good slap, so I had lots of little black deposits on my legs yesterday as I must have killed upwards of a dozen of them.
Title: Re: Bloody leg-chomping little gits!
Post by: tatanab on 30 July, 2010, 02:36:57 pm
Blandford Fly http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A6756519
It seems we have a plague of them just now.  Recently reported in some daily newspapers that bites can fester and need hospital treatment.
Title: Re: Bloody leg-chomping little gits!
Post by: pixieannie on 30 July, 2010, 02:49:36 pm
Gulp... up to 22cm diameter lesions!
Title: Re: Bloody leg-chomping little gits!
Post by: woollypigs on 30 July, 2010, 04:12:53 pm
Quote from: tatanab on 30 July, 2010, 02:36:57 pm
Blandford Fly http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A6756519
It seems we have a plague of them just now.  Recently reported in some daily newspapers that bites can fester and need hospital treatment.
That looks rather harmless to me ...

(http://lh6.ggpht.com/_cZEDwoNgM2U/S1xypmzHLII/AAAAAAAAH2Y/bPGdd5wak5Y/s1600/DSC04218.JPG)
Title: Re: Bloody leg-chomping little gits!
Post by: Gus on 30 July, 2010, 04:48:48 pm

they must be real slow if you slapped them in tai chi style and speed  ;)
Title: Re: Bloody leg-chomping little gits!
Post by: Wowbagger on 30 July, 2010, 04:58:14 pm
I'd be surprised if the Blandford Fly was responsible: according to that piece it needs fast flowing water to breed. Southend doesn't have a lot of that.
Title: Re: Bloody leg-chomping little gits!
Post by: Wowbagger on 02 August, 2010, 09:20:24 pm
Whilst on my way to Sutton on Saturday for the Wedding of the YearTM, I happened to glance at a Daily Star which had a piece about the prevalence of the Blandford Fly this summer, which they described as being "warm and Wet" and therefore ideal conditions for the little buggers to breed.