General > General Technical Chat
Kill a fly in mid-air?
<< < (10/11) > >>
Nominal Animal:
Up north, we have a few dozen bird houses to help manage the local mosquito/gnat/midge/fly population in check.
I love the local spiders, especially indoors, because none are any danger at all to humans: their fangs cannot pierce human skin, and they have no parasites that can infect/migrate to humans.  They eat the ones that manage to avoid the netting, which means I don't have to use Raid to get some sleep.

The birds do funny stuff.  If you're there when they start nesting, they learn to accept your presence without getting alarmed, and will interact with you in funny ways.  When mowing the lawn, they like to check what gets exposed; when splitting wood, check if tasty morsels are revealed.  In the evenings, when the flying bloodsuckers form visible clouds, if you're outside puttering about, the birds fly around you catching dozens of them at once, sometimes even landing on you, with several bugs lined up in their beak.

A line of female goldeneyes have nested in two specific birdhouses for decades.  I swear they know us; they definitely don't seem to be bothered us doing yard stuff beneath the birdhouse, and feel safe coming back even if we stand just a couple of meters away.  One year, mom had netting to stop rabbits from eating the berry bushes, blocking the goldeneyes' chosen path to the lake, with a couple of the little goldeneyelings being unable to get through.  Mom had to lift them over by hand, but the goldeneye wasn't frazzled, just waited patiently tapping her feet, the way ducks do to tell their ducklings to come along.
Siwastaja:

--- Quote from: jpanhalt on August 31, 2023, 08:59:09 pm ---@Siwastaja
Don't bother inviting me to diner.  ;)

--- End quote ---

Dear jpanhalt, you are most welcome to enjoy dinner with us (including all the flying little friends).

But quite seriously, I'm under an assumption that houseflies here are nearly 99.999% free of any diseases or parasites, just like the mosquitoes do not spread any diseases either. Except when they do, and maybe the risk is slowly increasing with the climate warming, but I still consider it a very low risk item. If I were to live in India, I might consider buying the UV zapper thing instead of keeping houseflies as pets.
Nominal Animal:

--- Quote from: Siwastaja on September 01, 2023, 06:05:33 am ---But quite seriously, I'm under an assumption that houseflies here are nearly 99.999% free of any diseases or parasites, just like the mosquitoes do not spread any diseases either.
--- End quote ---
Myiasis does not occur with houseflies here at all; even with lipoptena cervi and hybomitra it is unheard of.  There isn't a Finnish word at all for myiasis, as it only occurs here with deer, moose, reindeer, horses, and cows.  You might get a stomach bug from housefly-tampered food, but that's about it.

Mosquitoes do spread tularemia (rabbit fever), Pogosta disease, and Inkoo encephalitis.  Half of tularemia cases have no symptoms, typically it shows up as a summer/autumn cold.  Pogosta disease is a rash at the bite site.  Inkoo encephalitis is a flu-like virus infection mostly affecting kids.  In some cases, these can all trigger long-term joint pain issues, but it isn't clear whether that is actually an autoimmune effect.  In typical years all these cases are counted in the dozens, and if you get hundred cases (out of a population of 5.5 million), it is classified an epidemic.  These are not deadly.

Tick-borne diseases and aerosolized bank vole droppings are a bigger risk.  Most Finns are immune to the Puumala virus (and if we catch it as a kid, it will only have flu-like symptoms and give a life-long immunity), but an Israeli researcher did die of it a few years ago here.  It does not spread at all, you can only catch it directly from the vole droppings.  Ticks spread borreliosis, tick-borne encephalitis (TBEV-Sib and TBEV-FE), and there has been one case of babesiosis.  Fortunately, both borreliosis or encephalitis infection can be avoided by removing the tick early (and correctly, including its mouth parts, which can be left in the bite if incorrectly removed).  Borreliosis can usually be treated with antibiotics, and there is a vaccine against TBEV.
Rick Law:

--- Quote from: Nominal Animal on September 01, 2023, 06:58:16 am ---
--- Quote from: Siwastaja on September 01, 2023, 06:05:33 am ---But quite seriously, I'm under an assumption that houseflies here are nearly 99.999% free of any diseases or parasites, just like the mosquitoes do not spread any diseases either.
--- End quote ---
Myiasis does not occur with houseflies here at all; even with lipoptena cervi and hybomitra it is unheard of.  There isn't a Finnish word at all for myiasis, as it only occurs here with deer, moose, reindeer, horses, and cows.  You might get a stomach bug from housefly-tampered food, but that's about it.

Mosquitoes do spread tularemia (rabbit fever), Pogosta disease, and Inkoo encephalitis.
... ...

--- End quote ---

Flies eat by throwing up their digestive fluid onto their food, then suck up the digesting mess.  So if a fly had attempted to feed from your plate of food, you may well be eating your food plus some fly saliva.  Just the thought of that makes me loose my appetite.

Mosquito bites will cause skin irritation at minimum, scratching it or fussing with it further can cause further skin rashes.

The pluses, I suppose: when I am taking care of my kid's cat, he does enjoy hunting them down.  So they are a cat-toy to some degree.
paulca:
We have "miggies", tiny little mosquitto life gnats which will and do eat you alive.  Usually in the evenings, when camping or sitting out for an evening and they start to eat your head.  It's not sore, it's just really, really irritating.  When they are really, really bad you can end up just havivg to leave because you are literally scratching your head raw.  They are completely impervious to bug repeelent.  The only way to stop them is a raging camp fire.
Navigation
Message Index
Next page
Previous page
There was an error while thanking
Thanking...

Go to full version
Powered by SMFPacks Advanced Attachments Uploader Mod