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Chiggers are close to spiders, but very very small, enough so that people don't notice them while doing activities. The bite creates a tube-like area of affected skin that continues to itch for as much as a week or two. Anti-itch remedies are only barely effective, so once bitten you have to tough it out. I've been bitten a few times by them. Miserable critters. I can sorta see how people could confuse them with lice.
Chiggers are close to spiders, but very very small, enough so that people don't notice them while doing activities. The bite creates a tube-like area of affected skin that continues to itch for as much as a week or two. Anti-itch remedies are only barely effective, so once bitten you have to tough it out. I've been bitten a few times by them. Miserable critters. I can sorta see how people could confuse them with lice.
Doesn't lice look like maggots, Harry? I guess I have been fortunate enough to not have gotten bitten by chiggers, yet. Anti-itch stuff doesn't work well on red ant bites either.
Lice - white and small. I was more thinking the confusion might come from the general discomfort.
My lower legs used to get covered with ant bites and chigger bites. Insect repellent didn't stop it, and the bite marks can last for ages. I finally got some lightweight men's leggings and pulled my socks over the bottom. No more bites. More importantly, ticks now don't try to attach to me. If the deer and squirrels don't understand my fashion, so what? (I have my own forest and fields.)
I know how bad the tick borne illnesses can be, and IMO protection from those bites is every bit as important as a flu shot.
Supposedly that is where the saying " don't let the bedbugs bite" comes from as way back in the day people used the Spanish Moss to stuff into a bag of sorts to make a mattress.
Before I moved to the desert I was a tick magnet - close, but not exactly what I was going for. No ticks or chiggers here and no mosquito bites in five years. We have other little beasties.
Supposedly that is where the saying " don't let the bedbugs bite" comes from as way back in the day people used the Spanish Moss to stuff into a bag of sorts to make a mattress.
Before I moved to the desert I was a tick magnet - close, but not exactly what I was going for. No ticks or chiggers here and no mosquito bites in five years. We have other little beasties.
Yuck, thanks, kate.
I am a mosquito magnet. I've only had one tick in my life get into my skin. Do I even dare ask what other beasties you have besides scorpions and snakes, Sun??
I am a mosquito magnet. I've only had one tick in my life get into my skin. Do I even dare ask what other beasties you have besides scorpions and snakes, Sun??
I feel blessed because ive never lived anywhere where ticks were a problem, even in our last house in the woods with abundant deer and other critters. The only place ive ever lived with bugs that I hate is here in GA with the palmetto bugs. They are harmless, but they still creep me out.
I call Palmetto bugs "flying cockroaches". They are gross. I have only seen them in Texas. I know we have them here but fortunately I haven't seen one yet.
Hee-hee, maybe tomorrow one of us can get us off creepy bugs? Lol, sorry I started!
I am a mosquito magnet. I've only had one tick in my life get into my skin. Do I even dare ask what other beasties you have besides scorpions and snakes, Sun??
I think my record is 13 ticks at one time. I'd get them even cutting the grass. I'm surprised that I never came down with Lyme or any other disease from them.
I'll encounter something wild almost every day. We have Roadrunners that keep the snake population controlled (Beep-beep). I've never seen a rattlesnake but I have a couple coachwhip snakes show up occasionally. Lots of lizards. I've had a couple scorpions in the house but they are always dead thanks to my cat, I think. We have really nasty centipedes that will give you a painful bite -- I had one that was almost 7 inches long near my pond. I had a couple little ones in the house...also dead. There are Vinegaroons that will spray vinegar on you if disturbed but I've not had that charming experience. They like a damper environment. Desert rats ate the wiring on my truck. They make the wire insulation out of soy and that must be a treat for rodents. Coyotes own the place, we just get to stay here. They keep some of the other populations in check. Jackrabbits are the size of small kangaroos. Desert cottontails will eat your flowers or vegetables. Owls and hawks will steal small pets. There is a resident Mountain Lion that is radio monitored and he roams up and down the river forest. I put up a critter cam to see if he comes by. Apart from that, it's pretty nice not having ticks and mosquitos. You learn to live with the other stuff and they really don't want any part of you.
My dad came down with the Lyme disease, Suns. I don't recall how it was treated and I know that had nothing to do with his death. I just remember seeing those red rings around the infected area.
One species of that snake kinda looks like our Eastern Diamondback.
I'd like to see a real Roadrunner! Beep, beep!
Soy? I am shocked that rats don't eat everyone's wiring!! Everyone lives just 3 feet, I think it is, from a rat they say.
There was a den of coyotes down the street from my house on White Horse Beach in Massachusetts and I walked by it almost every single day yet I never saw them except when they were walking the neighborhood. The adults never bothered my animals either. They could have easily scaled the fence.
Holy crap!! Those Vinegaroons are so wicked ugly!! I'm sorry I looked at a picture!! I've seen regular scorpions up close and personal in Texas and I'll take them, tyvm!!! Man.........
Haven't seen a jackrabbit, we only have cottontails as far as I know.
We have Florida jaguars, not just the two legged ones who play football. We have panthers/cougars, which, I think are mountain lions. We had them in Massachusetts too.
Of course alligators. Burmese pythons too, which are killing the Everglades. Between the manufacturing of sugar and the pythons, the Everglades with be a barren lake with nothing alive in it fairly soon.
I am taking another lazy day. Not even getting out of my pjs. Just sitting in my recliner with my fans on blowing nice air around me.
Hagd everyone.
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I've only had one tick in my life get into my skin. Do I even dare ask what other beasties you have besides scorpions and snakes, Sun??
