Burn all the things or just some of the things?

August 8, 2022 10:49 PM

I was sitting at my desk at work when I felt this bug bite me on the arm. I'm tentatively IDing it as a body louse, absolutely please please please correct me if I'm wrong. I just spent an hour in the office bathroom checking myself and my clothes and didn't find any of the other signs of lice. What bit me?? Is it even remotely possible that a single solitary louse somehow just ended up on my arm and didn't bring an army of its friends??? What do I do now???? HALP!!!

I am extremely neurotic about insects (and I've had bedbugs in the past) so I'm fairly confident in my ability to distinguish nits from other crud if they were hiding in the seams of my clothes. I checked the crevices of my desk chair and my shoulder bag and they also look clear.

I also checked my scalp and I'm pretty sure my dandruff is just dandruff. (I am prone to itchy flaky skin/scalp but thus also hyperaware of it and I don't think anything is out of the ordinary right now.)

I plan on getting a head lice comb and giving my hair a proper check once I get home. I will be inspecting my bedding, upholstery, and unwashed clothes before blasting everything on the hottest setting my washer is capable of. I will also be going full on lice-picking monkey on my dog and partner.

What else should I do? How freaked out should I be???

posted by anonymous to Health & Fitness (8 answers total)

Listen, I don't know any more about insects than the average person but Google image search thought it was an aphid wolf larva, and after reading a nearly identical bite story with a very very similar photo, I'm inclined to agree. Personally that's all the much farther I'd go in the freak-out continuum.
posted by teremala at 11:32 PM on August 8, 2022 [13 favorites]

The pointy tail and the pincer-like mandibles do not look louselike to me at all (lice that feed on mammals have sucking mouthparts). I agree with teremala's ID and also with their "no freaking out is needed" conclusion.

It grows up to be very pretty!
posted by ManyLeggedCreature at 1:52 AM on August 9, 2022 [7 favorites]

Yep, somehow or another it ended up on you, and decided to see if you were in fact an aphid. Presumably, you were not, and are not, an aphid, and as such you have nothing to worry about.

Think about how much it would suck to be an aphid to be bit by one of these guys though! I remember having an aphid problem at one point, and then it just started going away. Closer inspection revealed quite a number of aphid lions. I am fan!
posted by rockindata at 5:08 AM on August 9, 2022 [3 favorites]

Have seen many hair lice throughout my son's Kindergarten and primary school years, this is definitely not a louse that lives in hair on scalp. I am fairly sure that it is also not a louse that lives in pubic hair (they are a separate kind from hair lice, and i have not seen them but from pictures i would say no). Agree with others it is an aphid eating lacewing. They do bite.
posted by 15L06 at 5:40 AM on August 9, 2022 [3 favorites]

My insect identifying app (Picture Insect) says based on your pic that this is a lacewing larva.
posted by castlebravo at 5:47 AM on August 9, 2022 [1 favorite]

Check nearby plants in the office. Perhaps you’ll see more there and then you’ll know they are there for the aphids!
posted by amanda at 7:28 AM on August 9, 2022

Absolutely not a louse. I know far more about lice than I want to know, and that is not one, of any type.

Sometimes animal lice will bite humans once or twice and then depart, and you shouldn't worry about them, though they are a bother. But this isn't any type of louse.
posted by mumimor at 7:43 AM on August 9, 2022 [4 favorites]

Body lice are pretty rare in the developed modern world, and it's definitely not a head louse--I was raised amongst hippies so I am extremely confident in IDing head lice, hooray. That's just a little forest guy who probably brushed off on your clothes from some landscaping.
posted by Nibbly Fang at 7:53 AM on August 15, 2022