Though some people refer to them as “no-see-ums,” you will see them in your yard. You will see them at the park. You will see them when you’re waiting outside to pick your child up from school.

“They’re everywhere right now,” Mike Hendrickson, Black Hawk County Conservation executive director, said of the tiny black bugs that are annoying so many people this time of year. “You can hardly go outside or any place in Black Hawk County without encountering them. To me, they seem to be worse in the last week to 10 days.”

Hendrickson is talking about minute pirate bugs (orius insidious) – also known as insidious flower bugs – and their bite is much worse than their, well, whatever sound a minute pirate bug makes.

“They pack a pretty good wallop,” he said.

Donald Lewis, a retired Iowa State U

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