Gross and disgusting

Ya'll know how much I love bugs. They are my hobby and my passion, and I learned to take photos mainly for the sake of "collecting" them without killing them.

Yet every now and then there comes a bug that makes me shudder and lose sleep, especially if I see it in my house, and especially - more than once!

So, when I saw this spider-looking creature crawling on my curtains, I looked closely and noticed that it had six legs and two wings. A fly, and a nasty looking one at that. At first glance it looked like a bloodsucker and that's just what it turned out to be. These are called louse flies, and this specific one usually lives on birds- swifts and swallows. Did I mention there is a swift nest right above my balcony? What's worse is that if they fall off the birds they start crawling around looking for a new host, and have no problem attacking humans. In fact, they can suck 20 mg of blood in 5 minutes!

The next day I found another one, and yesterday - the third. I wonder if they already killed the poor swift fledglings and are now crawling around looking for somebody else to suck the life out of?



I took a close-up pic to identify it, but when I looked at the photo on my computer I found more than I was looking for. That thing coming out of it is not what you think it is - it's larva! These disgusting creatures hatch out of the eggs inside the mother and come out as a larva. Efficient, isn't it?

So, with all due respect to other artropods I just have to say: ew-w-w-w, gross!!!!!!!!