Friday, August 27, 2010
Horseflies In The Reelfoot Region
KENTUCKY...
Perhaps a swat team of a different nature is needed in the Reelfoot Lake region of West Tennessee and western Kentucky after clouds of horseflies emerged.
Nobody's counting the pests, but University of Tennessee at Martin biology chairman Dr. Jack Grubaugh says when he first arrived in July from the University of Memphis, he thought, "Wow, Martin has a lot of horseflies."
Down at the Obion County Farmers Cooperative, Hunter Stephens told the Union City Daily Messenger pesticide sales are brisk in a season that has produced more horseflies than Stephens has ever seen before.
Back at the university, Grubaugh says the reason horsefly bites sting so much is that the pests slice you open with swordlike mouth parts and lap up the blood that pools.
File this away: only female flies bite. Males eat only plants.
Perhaps a swat team of a different nature is needed in the Reelfoot Lake region of West Tennessee and western Kentucky after clouds of horseflies emerged.
Nobody's counting the pests, but University of Tennessee at Martin biology chairman Dr. Jack Grubaugh says when he first arrived in July from the University of Memphis, he thought, "Wow, Martin has a lot of horseflies."
Down at the Obion County Farmers Cooperative, Hunter Stephens told the Union City Daily Messenger pesticide sales are brisk in a season that has produced more horseflies than Stephens has ever seen before.
Back at the university, Grubaugh says the reason horsefly bites sting so much is that the pests slice you open with swordlike mouth parts and lap up the blood that pools.
File this away: only female flies bite. Males eat only plants.
# posted by Homer Owens @ 9:52 AM 
