18 Winter 2015 Applegater Notes from a Rogue entomologist defined BY RICHARD J. HILTON

As another election year draws rather appalled by this near, it seems appropriate to write about occurrence, I will freely blood-sucking parasites. admit that I did find it I am old enough to remember somewhat fascinating. when the playground taunt “be careful The fact that adults or you’ll get cooties” was commonplace. do not commonly get We even had the game “Cootie,” where infested by head lice the goal was to construct an insect model. may have played a role However, growing up I really had no in my dispassionate idea what a cootie was. I thought it was approach to this a reference to germs in general and not to problem. This event did lice, the wingless blood-sucking insects. take place almost 20 Head image from a scanning electron microscope And due to my sheltered life as a youth years ago, and I recall (www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2480876/). and the widespread use of insecticides for that it was one of the louse control after World War II, I never first times that I really had a close encounter with lice when I used the Internet to was in school. So it was a bit startling research a topic, finding when our daughter came down with a that, while it was an case of head lice while at Jacksonville incredible source of Elementary School. information, it was also These insects are obligate full of bogus remedies. ectoparasites, meaning they have to In other words, not be living on a host. In the case of head much has changed on lice, the host is most often a child from that score. 3 to 11 years old. Head lice live, as the Since female name suggests, in the child’s hair. A lice glue their closely related species, the , eggs, or nits, to the Head lice nit and adults. The adults are between lives on clothing and is a vector of host’s hair shaft close to 2.5 and 3 mm in size (www.micrographia.com). typhus. Body lice can become widespread the scalp, one obvious during times of war and dislocation solution is to remove all the hair. Of the undiluted shampoo and left one when soldiers and refugees are living in course, shaving off your ten-year-old untreated as a control. close quarters, often in very unsanitary daughter’s hair, while quick and easy, is Head lice cannot survive long conditions. Epidemic typhus was often not really a suitable option. So, while my off a scalp in the best of circumstances, a major cause of death in earlier times. wife was busy cleaning everything like about 24 hours, but after one night Another louse that infests humans is the crazy and using a special-order nit comb there was essentially no difference in pubic louse, also known as the in painstaking fashion on our daughter’s the activity of the lice that had been or simply crabs, and I will say no more rather curly and luxuriant hair (and she submerged in the insecticidal shampoo on that topic. But, interestingly, neither did not particularly like to sit still at that and the untreated control louse. I head lice nor pubic lice are known to age), I was running an experiment. therefore concluded that the population transmit disease. There were reports that head lice of lice that we were dealing with was, Since young children, girls in were becoming resistant to the standard indeed, resistant to the insecticide. particular, like to share clothes, hats, over-the-counter shampoo treatment Obviously it would have been brushes, scrunchies and other hair- that included a pyrethrin insecticide. good to have more specimens to test, related accessories, it is no surprise that We were able to recover about three or but the supply was limited. That is one head lice can readily spread from one four live adult lice from my daughter’s of the difficulties of doing research on child to another. So, while my wife was scalp, and I proceeded to put some in an obligate human parasite. In the end, the answer to the problem was a lot of nitpicking by my wife (as I said earlier, New fundraising some things don’t change). source for Richard J. Hilton the Applegater! 541-772-5165 ext. 227 Senior Faculty Research Assistant / We are partnering with Open Eyes Open Heart, a new fundraising website, Entomologist because we believe it to be a “win-win” situation. Here’s why and how: Oregon State University-Southern • Perfect timing for finding special holiday gifts. Oregon Research & Extension Center • 50 percent of your purchases will go directly to the Applegater. [email protected] • Visit the website at www.fundraisingwithheart.com. • Check out all the creative and affordable jewelry, and shop till you drop. • On checkout, enter the Applegater’s promo code: GATERAID. • The website is owned and managed by Applegate Valley residents with years of experience is nonprofit organizations who want to “put the love back” into fundraising. Visit the site and let us know what you think. Thank you for your support! Applegater Board of Directors

Advertisers! For rates and other information, contact: Ron Turpen 541-601-1867 [email protected] Next deadline: February 1