Perfect swarm: Experts confirm plague of midges

Senior features writer

Friday 13 July 2012

A LEADING authority on the winged scourge of Scotland has confirmed what many walkers, campers, gardeners and holidaymakers already suspected: The country is being plagued by record numbers of midges.

SCOURGE: Record numbers of midges are already plaguing everyone from gardeners to holidaymakers. Pictures: Colin Mearns

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Maureen Ellis

Dundee-based Advanced Pest Solutions (APS), which compiles the Scottish Midge Forecast website, has found a four-fold increase year-on-year in the number of midges caught at sample sites across Scotland.

The company, which in five days last week took orders for 10,000 bottles of its own-formula repellent, Smidge, reported seven times as many midges as last year have been captured at one site in the Galloway Forest.

APS director Dr Alison Blackwell said: "It has been a bumper season of late. We have a number of people trapping for us across the country, and even by the beginning of June some of our people had already caught more than they had last year."This could be bad news for tourism, with midges already estimated to cost the industry more than £300 million annually. June and Timmy Palmer, who own the Beinglas campsite at Inverarnan, north of Loch Lomond, said trade has been affected this year more than any other in the 18 years they have been in business."We've been told we should be condemned because of the midges," said Mrs Palmer, 44."We get a lot of irate customers. What can you do? This is the worst year we've seen of them – just the mass of them. They're out all day now. It used to be just morning and night."The couple spent £1200 on a Mosquito Magnet trapping machine, but estimate they would need around a dozen to make an impact."It makes life a lot harder," added Mr Palmer, 43. "We have people who book in for three nights and, because of the ferociousness of the midges, they come back and ask for a refund."APS says the heavy rain and sunny spells have created the perfect breeding conditions for midges, with a second generation currently emerging.If there are few dry, hot spells to reduce their numbers, Dr Blackwell expects midge prevalence to remain high throughout the summer – and she points to the possibility of a third generation in September."We don't often get three generations," she added. "It very much depends what happens over the next couple of weeks."Nigel Price, property manager of the National Trust for Scotland-owned Crarae Garden, near Inveraray, sends data to the midge forecast website twice a week.He collected 50ml of midges – about 41,600 of the beasties – from a £650 Predator machine on Monday morning. In the period from May 10 to July 9, he has collected more than 4.5 mil-lion midges from the trap – a three-fold increase on last year's tally over the same period."They're disgusting things – I can never tire of killing them, actually," said Mr Price, who has customised a midge net using an old pair of spectacles. Dog walker George Johnston, 80, is philosophical about the tiny menaces, even as he swats them away in Crarae Garden."They're obviously on this world for a reason, like all things of nature. Somebody or something is benefiting from them. They're a part of Argyll."German tourists Tjaart Schroeder and Marius Oberle were determined to complete the 95-mile West Highland Way trail without buying midge nets, but conceded defeat after two days.Mr Schroeder, 26, from Munich, said: "It's a little bit annoying to wear these nets – it's not good to breathe and it gets quite warm in them."Similarly, Martina Jurcova and Martin Barnovsky, who are originally from the Czech Republic and Slovakia respectively but now live in Edinburgh, said they could not consider bringing their seven-year-old daughter on their next walking holiday."I heard about midges, but I didn't know what the fuss was about. Now I know after camping two nights," said Ms Jurcova, 34. "If I'd known, we wouldn't have bought a tent because there is no use for it in the future."

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Perfect swarm: Experts confirm plague of midges

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