Another reason besides Zika Virus to avoid mosquito bites in Florida! May be disturbing to some viewers! Bot Flies, Warbles, Wolf Worms, Mango Worms - they have many names, but they are nasty and they are back again this hot summer (Florida, late July 2016). This video shows some of the Backyard Gray Squirrels dealing with this mosquito borne seasonal scourge that they suffer every summer. Not all of the squirrels have them - yet. One poor guy has them in his shoulder, leg and testicles which seems particularly nasty. The video shows them stoically carrying on and doing a lot of scratching and biting. Last year at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=orx-xLZrry0
I noted they typically fully recover especially with extra food and fresh water provided by kindly humans. It is also interesting to note that the worst off fellow appears to be eating dirt or charcoal as a way of providing essential nutrients and maybe animal medicine. There really is nothing to be done medically for them as catching wild squirrels and restraining them while trying to cleanly remove and disinfect the worm area would be very stress inducing and risk injury and infection. It is said that these type of bot flies do not transfer to humans by mosquito bites in Florida as they do in Central America, but with Zika and everything else around I try to avoid any mosquito bites - but that's nearly impossible!
More detailed information can be found at:
http://entnemdept.ufl.edu/creatures/misc/flies/squirrel_bot_fly.htm
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