Question For Bq, Yukon Or Any Alaskan Resident

[agabbymama]

Just returned from my cruisetour to Alaska. I was prepared to encounter mosquitoes and black flies (actually look more like a bee of some kind to me), but we encountered a small (maybe 1/4") black kind of hard shelled bug that would crawl on you and start biting.

 

Any idea what it might be? I tried searching the internet, but mosquitoes, black flies, no see-ums and midgies are all that come up. It definitely was not a mosquito (we did see a few), nor a black fly (didn't see any of those). You could definitely see this so don't think no see-ums or midgies would qualify. It was totally black, didn't see any wings, but they could have them. And they definitely were biting us as we slapped them and killed them. Didn't think to ask any of the locals what they were. We were in the Interior and just took all the bugs (gnats, bees, flies, mosquitoes) along with the tour.

 

Thanks for any input.

[Yukon]

I believe those little beasts are gnats - at least that's the term I've always used. They come out after the first frost and die at the first really hard frost - 4-6 weeks or so. We occasionally get clouds of them that make being outside all but impossible, but usually they're just a minor nuisance.

 

Murray

[agabbymama]

Thanks for the response. I don't think this thing was flying, and the body was bigger than most gnats I've seen. It seemed to crawl up my pant leg and was crawling on my husbands arm. We never did see them fly, nor did we see swarms of them. Just the two.

[Yukon]

Oh, wrong bug - I have no idea what that was.

[mytime53]

I thought about this off and on all day, and nothing seems to fit the description.