UKC

How bad are the midges up there? Looking to possibly head there next weekend, don't feel like being in the insect equivalent of Hitchcock's Birds.

In reply to shoo: They'll be bad on the 23rd but the wind on the Sunday should help keep them away.

In reply to shoo:
It'll be fine - the torrential rain will keep them off.

In reply to shoo: I was eaten alive on tuesday at stanage, still itching

In reply to shoo:
Last Sunday on Stanage it was very still. However, midges didn't appear until about 3pm (then got bitten a lot). I think it was the gale force winds on Saturday blowing them miles away and it took them that long to fly back.
Forecast for this weekend is not good....

In reply to shoo: which peaks are you thinking of?

In reply to shoo: these midge posts make me laugh...are you seriously that if someone on here says they are bad you wont go climbing?
Just get up here and get some routes done midge or no.

Yep if it is bad I won't go climbing because bad can be very bad...

In reply to bz:

Not exactly Hillary and Tenzing is it?

In reply to jimjimjim:

Have you seriously not yet experienced Peak midges at their worst? (They seem to have become a lot worse over the last decade.) Only lunatics still keep climbing. Once the midges get that bad you just have to keep moving, at c. 4 mph ... to the nearest pub.

In reply to Gordon Stainforth:

I remember a day at the roaches a couple of years ago that we we're inhaling them on the lower tier. I now own a midge head net.

In reply to Bulls Crack:

Phew ... can you imagine what would have happened if there had been midges like those in the Peak, or worse, Skye, on the Hillary Step? Or not happened.

In reply to EZ:

I suppose if you're really keen you climb in that gear? What a wonderful image.

In reply to Gordon Stainforth:

Yes mate. Just cover all of your skin and lock down the openings for them to get in and you're sorted.

In reply to Gordon Stainforth: Only once in over 12 years of regular peak climbing have i been midged off a crag. In that instance we just went on to some limestone away from the moors. Skye...now thay know how to do midges, still went out climbing though, hard as f**k my mob.

In reply to Bulls Crack:
What! Do they get up to the S Col?

In reply to shoo:

Burbage has always been okay in my experience, but perhaps i've always been lucky.

I can remember being amused at my brother frowning at being midged while I felt unbothered by them while at Burbage North once, I always seem to itch later when other people are swatting at them, I think mentally putting them to the background is handy maybe, I kind of know i'm being bitten but think about something else I think.

Burbage is nice, it's got to be worth the trip/risk, i've never been really badly midged there. ()

Maybe try starting a thread asking for good peak crags during the midge season?

Tim

In reply to Timmd:

Burbage was not OK on Tuesday, clouds of the buggers. However, we moved on to the Cowper Stone and it was midge free.

In reply to shoo: http://2010.midgeforecast.co.uk/

Unfortunately still only available in Scotland!

In reply to Natalie feather:

Maybe they should devolve themselves and change their domain to http//2010.midgeforecast.co.scotland/

In reply to shoo:

When the midges are out and you must climb grit you dont have to go to Stanage. Lots of stuff in the south off the Froggatt guide that are hardly ever midge affected.

In reply to shoo:
You can't put Deet in your eyes, so they attack you there - at least, that's how it feels.

When it's midgey, go climb lime.

In reply to Cake: its a myth that the little bastards dont do limestone, I'v been badly midged at Peak Scar.

In reply to pebbles: depends on the crag. They mostly live in peat so crags around the moors are the worst. They also live in streams and lakes altho not as much as the peat moors. If you fimd a crag without water or peat next to it, in my experience youll be ok.

In reply to shoo: Want some midges? I bet we could arrange a couple of lorry loads from Skye....

Thanks! Mostly just trying to decide where to climb that will be relatively midgeless. Thinking some sea cliffing might be in order.