Caberfeidh wrote:The coldness of the winter does not seem to affect them at all. They survive in the frozen ground, in suspended animation, to rise and torment the world again when Beelzebub himself ordains it thus. The terrible winters about ten years ago had no effect on them, despite it being well below zero for months on end.The only thing that affects them seems to be drought. In the long hot summers of 1976 and '77 the highlands were almost devoid of midgies, as their breeding waters had dried up. Unfortunately they resurrected themselves quickly. We need to genetically modify trout by cross-breeding them with flying fish so the trout can fly through the air and eat the little buggers on the wing. Imagine Rannoch Moor covered with flocks of flying trout flapping around with their mouths open, sieving midgies out of the air like basking sharks sieving plankton. It would be like those flocks of birds over the Wash, murmurating and swarming all over the place. It is our only hope.
At last, some sense in a mad, mad world.
Though the worst midges I can actually remember were wild camping on Rannoch Moor in 1976, so I'm not 100% sure the drought thing is enough to rid us of of the menace, as presumably the fish won't be that fond of droughts either.
As for the ticks, I'm wondering if we all spend, say, five years completely and paralytically drunk, and include the deer in the party, they'll all die of alcohol poisoning?
