As the summer progresses and my skin plays host to various biting beasties, I find myself pondering which of them is the most infuriating. Which of them is most likely to sabotage my outdoors enjoyment?
I have my own personal torments, but I’m curious what other people think about our wee beasties. Time therefore, for a famously unscientific poll to see how you, the outdoorsy folk, feel about them.
I asked….
Which of these lovely wee critters traumatises you the most when you’re trying to enjoy Scotland’s great outdoors?
There are of course a whole host of annoyances out there, but because Twitter can only manage four options in its polls, I limited myself to the biting things that most of us likely encounter when we’re out & about. Suffice to say, the response was fantastic, with 1728 votes and some enlightening comments.
So, in reverse order….
KEDS – 2% of the vote
Chances are, you’re reading this and thinking the same thing as many other people in the poll:
‘I have no idea what keds are’
‘Not sure I’ve experienced Keds yet…never heard of em!?’
Also known as deer flies or louse flies, keds appear later in the year than the other biting beasties, typically late summer into autumn.If you’ve already met, then you probably have anecdotes about finding them crawling in your hair. I certainly do, and the poll’s responses were no exception:
‘Keds hide in my hair for hours waiting to fall out when I’m least expecting.’
‘Keds land in your hair, an annoyance, nothing more.’
‘I got loads of these bloody things on my head going up Aonach Beag, spider flies we called them.‘
Keds are weird, no question about that. When they land on their host species (usually deer) they shed their wings and then burrow down through the fur to find their blood meal.
A combination of gripping claws, flatness, and being shiny and smooth means they’re almost impossible to swipe off. Your swatting hand just slides over them. Instead, you actually have to pinch them between your finger and thumb to remove them, and when you do they feel disturbingly wriggly and robust.
These unique qualities give them an icky otherworldliness that the others lack, and probably explains why one word in particular came up again and again.
‘I’ve never been bitten by one but they can be sticky – and a bit creepy!’
‘Keds are creepy AF, but harmless’
‘In my experience keds may be creepy and frustrating but they don’t bite, so they are in the relegation zone.’
For one person the ick-factor was much easier to pin down:
‘Don’t like keds’ muscly wee thighs.’
Yep, I’d have to agree there. But while keds are little more than an unsettling annoyance for most, they still have the capacity to traumatise 2% of respondents beyond all the others on the list.
‘Horrific things, have a tendency, at least with me, to land on eyelids. Can’t get the buggers off & have to gouge eyes out to get rid of them.’
It’s interesting too, to see folk commenting that keds don’t bite humans. I thought so too till recently, but was basing that purely on personal experience, having never let one crawl on me long enough to find out. However….
‘Became sensitised to ked bites last year and they itched for weeks so they’re moving up the league.’
‘I might have been blaming clegs for my weals when it seems it could have been keds! Aaow!’
Clearly, keds are still something of an unknown quantity in Scotland. But given their bites can lead to dermatitis, and given there are ongoing studies into whether they can be a vector for Lyme Disease, it might be worth getting better acquainted!
CLEGS – 16.7% of the vote
Clegs edged it for quite a few of people in the poll. Folk down south will probably know them as horse-flies, but whatever term you use you’re in for a world of pain…..although possibly not if you’re the lucky person who said:
‘Clegs seem to leave me alone’
I know. There’s always one, isn’t there?
There are 30 species of horsefly in the UK, ranging from the rather imposing (inch long!) Dark Giant Horsefly to the rather more modest Notched-Horned Cleg. You’re very likely to have met the latter. At just 1cm long it is small, narrow, with patterned wings and beautiful eyes. Yep, seriously!
Clegs aren’t as infuriatingly persistent or speedy as your bog-standard swarm of flies, but they don’t give up easily and are annoyingly stealthy. Constant vigilance is required:
‘Less able to defend myself from them’
‘End up watching for them rather than relaxing.’
Hmm, I know that feeling. I’ve tripped over my feet when I’ve been watching clegs. But unlike the other beasties, respondents also sensed a kind of malevolence :
‘It does feel personal for clegs, there’s malice there somehow’
‘In terms of feeling targeted, chased and attacked it’s got to be clegs’
‘They stalk you from behind.’
But while some folk did acknowledge clegs were awful, they didn’t vote for them because perfect cleg conditions are infrequent:
‘Clegs horrific, but weather is rarely hot & sunny enough for them’
‘Clegs are only really bad on a few days each year.’
One solution, although not great in a heatwave, is what this person suggested:
‘I’ve become more careful about clothing as well, longer sleeved shirts etc’
But as others pointed out:
‘Clegs are horrible and will bite through clothing’.
Indeed. I’ve been bitten through a cotton t-shirt. That’s because clegs are armed to tackle horses and cattle, beasts with thick skin. For that, they need sharp, serrated jaws to break the surface. And yep, that hurts!
‘Def. Cleg. They zap you through clothing.’
‘Clegs because they hurt far more than midges.’
‘Ruin my karma due to the painful bites.’
‘Clegs, my absolute nightmare. I’ve been left bleeding many a time by them. The worst for me by a country mile!’
Unlike mozzies, clegs don’t inject an anaesthetic either, but the cleg trauma goes beyond a painful bite:
‘I’ve already been on antibiotics after getting bitten and it starting into cellulitis! ‘
‘I ended up on antibiotics after a nasty bite, dirty little blighters!!’
‘Once had my arm in a sling for 2 weeks due to a cleg bite on the hand.’
‘Ended up with cellulitis, and on a daily antibiotic drip for a week last summer’
‘Got bitten on the inside of wrist a few years ago, needed antibiotics because cellulitis had travelled up my arm’.
I was initially surprised at how many people had experienced severe reactions, but given the open nature of cleg wounds and their susceptibility to infection, I really shouldn’t have been. Without a doubt….
‘Clegs are bitey little buggers’.
TICKS – 27.3% of the vote
A tick ‘quests’ by climbing up long vegetation, stretching its legs out and waiting to grab onto a suitable host as it passes by. I’ve inadvertently picked up a lot of questing hitchhikers in my time, so it genuinely baffles me when I hear folk saying:
‘Don’t really get ticks’
How can that be!? Do questing ticks sense those people coming, decide they’re unpalatable for some reason and then think to themselves “nah, I’ll wait for the next one”? Given those people might be the only meals to pass by in its lifetime, you’d think the tick couldn’t afford to be that picky. Still, even the unpalatable among us feel ticks’ presence:
‘Either ticks don’t find me appetising, or I don’t find ticks. Still paranoid about the wee gits though.’
And that’s the rub. Unlike the other contenders in the poll, ticks menace you regardless of whether or not they’re even there. As one person put it:
‘The metaphorical dark cloud of ticks troubles me more than the real one of midges’
If they ARE there, they tend to crawl on you unfelt and unnoticed, especially if they’re tiny. Are they on your clothes or aren’t they? You can never really know for sure, which prompted one respondent to say:
‘Ticks wage psychological war. You get in and escape the midges, but the ticks may still be on you. They may be in your home *right now*’
For most (but by no means all) people, when ticks do bite they induce no pain or sensation whatsoever. Thereafter, while some folk (me included) are alerted to the bite by an obvious itching, generally the first we’re aware of a tick bite is when we find one already feeding on us. At that point, a few respondents were generally unfazed, saying:
‘Ticks are awful but you can remove them easily enough’
‘I pick up a lot of ticks but get them off before they bed in thankfully. A quick check every 20 mins or so if I’m in shorts sorts that out’
But for others, it’s the potential implications of that bite that secured their vote:
‘Ticks every time, just the fear of getting Lyme Disease’
Quite a few people clearly had ‘the fear’, but a significant number had also experienced the reality:
‘Had to choose ticks, because I got treated for Lyme Disease.’
‘Ticks are the worst by far. I’ve had two rounds of antibiotics for target bites’
‘Having had the Lyme sign and being fortunate to spot it early, I’d say ticks’
But for some respondents, even the ‘metaphorical dark cloud’ of ticks came second to the actual physical pain and annoyance of the other contenders:
‘I’ll take ticks over any of the bitey face-buzzers any day…(Said by someone who’s inexplicably managed to avoid Lyme so far)’
MIDGES – 54% of the vote
Was it ever in doubt? Probably not. I can’t believe there’s anyone out there who’s not been personally introduced, but for the sake of completeness, here goes.
There are just under 40 species of midge in the UK. Not all of them bite, but among those that do it is Culicoides impunctatus that has the biggest impact.
It likes soggy, cloudy, dull weather, the kind that much of Scotland excels at during the summer. They’re also attracted to dark-coloured, moving objects that emit carbon dioxide, something that tourists and hillwalkers also excel at during the summer.
They’re not good flyers, so a modest breeze is often ample protection. But even so, their annoying tendency to favour the wild, beautiful, wet and wooded places in Scotland that we love to visit, means that midges featured prominently in the poll and in people’s comments.
Obviously there was at least one of THOSE people again:
‘Midges are frustrating but they don’t bite me’
Ugh, what a beautiful world that must be! But most folk were at the other end of the scale, having ‘a resounding hatred of midges’, or were as resolute as this person:
‘Anybody who says anything other than Midges has never been to Scotland. Fact’
The two main reasons that came through loud and clear were profusion and persistence:
‘Midges have been the most constant ball-ache on hiking trips’.
‘Midges-constant. Constant. Constant. Just constant.…’
‘The others can be avoided, but midges if present, can’t’
And judging from your comments it seems midges are absolutely everywhere, ruining absolutely everything as they ‘they dominate the summer’ and ‘spoil the best bit of the year’:
‘I can’t even garden without getting my eyeballs eaten and a cloud of them invading.’
‘When midges are at their worst it’s very difficult to stay still for long enough to take any photos!’
‘Midges – for how much a swarm can screw up a day out, especially if you’re trying to camp’
T’he need in summer to plan a whole route and overnight camp spot because of where they will be, and still risk being plagued by them if the wind drops’.
But I liked this comment the most, as it best illustrates the cumulative result of a summer spent outdoors in Scotland:
‘they induce a kind of temporary insanity. AAARRRRGGGHH – they’re fecking EVERYWHERE! … THEY’RE INSIDE MY BRAIN!!’
So there you have it. Not entirely surprising results from a public vote I admit, but ideally I was looking for a six-option poll so that I could include mozzies and flies. So here are those two plus a couple of honourable mentions.
MOSQUITOES
For some reason, there’s a common perception out there that we don’t have mozzies in Scotland, but we do. Ten species, according to NatureScot. And while I wouldn’t structure a hill day around where mozzies are or are not, as they’re never THAT much of a problem, for me personally they easily have the worst bite of all. My whole arm swells up and the bite is outrageously itchy.
I’m not alone, either:
‘Mozzies are the ones who seem to like biting me and the older I get the worse the skin reactions. Midges have never bothered me. Clegs after the initial nip don’t bother me.’
‘Like you, I get a bad reaction to mozzie bites’
Someone suggested I try Marmite to deter them, something to do with the Vitamin B content I believe. But while I’m not averse to Marmite on toast once in a while, I’m less keen on smearing it onto my face and arms!
FLIES
Without a doubt, the bog-standard fly is the most annoying wing-ed beast out there. I’ve had upwards of 50 buzzing around my head at times – following me, landing on me, occasionally getting in my ears and nose. They’re just awful, and there’s absolutely nothing I can do to repel them.
The only success I’ve ever had was on Beinn Bhreac, when the flies seemed more interested in the sweat and suncream-soaked handles of my trekking poles than me. I held the poles aloft so that the handles were 4ft above my head, and walked all the way back to the Linn of Quoich like that. It worked a treat that day, but I wouldn’t recommend it as a permanent strategy!
HONOURABLE MENTIONS
‘You left out Kids!’ said one person, and I’m fairly certain it wasn’t a typo for ‘ked‘ either!
Others found it hard to choose just one:
‘Clegs by day midges by night.’
‘All of the above. Plus flies’
‘They all take turns.’
Someone also mentioned birch-flies as being bad.
‘Bro used to teach school kids at Loch Insh where they have Birch-Flies, kids would have streams of blood running down their necks but not know they’d been bitten.
Otherwise known as blackflies, these are a new one for me as I’ve never knowingly been bitten by them. Sound nasty though!
AND MY WINNER IS?
Hmm. I remember walking up Fraochaidh in autumn and the keds practically falling out the sky like rain on the breeze. Disconcerting to say the least, but as others have said, keds are more an icky annoyance for me personally.
Clegs drive me insane and the constant vigilance is exhausting, but I genuinely do love those beautiful eyes. If I see one land I’ll rush to take a macro photo, so nope, I can’t vote for clegs either. I know their bites are bad, but mozzies are worse.
Midges? Well, because I don’t go away camping or do much walking over the summer, I can’t say I’m ever really plagued by them. So long as I’m moving or there’s a breeze, I find I can cope. I’d certainly go for a walk on a calm, damp midgey evening and, to be honest, even doing ecology work in soggy glens isn’t too traumatic so long as I’m netted up and Smidged to the hilt.
I will however readily abandon a planned walk on a calm, humid day because I know it will be a raisin-fest, with flies hounding me all day. In that sense flies, rather than midges, clegs or keds, are more likely to get my vote because they actually stop me from going outside. Even ticks don’t do that!
However. Ticks are the only one I consciously factor into my route planning, because I’ll avoid certain places or habitats completely. Bracken-covered glens for example, such as most of the ones in the Ochils, I just don’t go near outwith the winter months.
I also change my behaviour for ticks, preferring not to sit down on the ground unless it’s on a rock or at high altitude, being extra careful if I put my rucksack or camera case down, and constantly checking (and brushing!) myself throughout the day. Ticks also determine what I wear – I certainly never wear shorts and will usually either wear gaiters (even in summer) or tuck my trousers into my socks.
And to cap it all off, every night before I go to bed I check myself all over, just in case. I don’t have any fear of lingering problems with a cleg or midge bite, just itchiness, but with ticks there’s a lingering vigilance required for days after you’ve been outdoors, or weeks if you’ve been bitten. And unlike all the other beasties in this article, ticks are fast becoming a problem all year round.
Guarding against ticks therefore requires entire lifestyle adjustments, whereas the others can be negated by weather, seasons or other factors. As one similarly minded person said:
Ticks, because they offer the greatest long term risk. The others are just on a scale of irritating to painful.
So yep, it’s ticks for me. 72.7% of you won’t agree with my choice but I guess it just highlights how individual our ‘beastie’ experiences are, depending on how ‘palatable’ each of us are.
Speaking of which…..pass the Marmite, would you?