newly infested

[Guest guest]

It has been an exceptionaly dry summer in Memphis with rainfall 18

inches below normal. Iver the 4th of July weekend I moved into an

apartment in an older building in an historic area of town.

The lady that lives below me began feeding a pigeon. The next thing

we know, we have several pigeons. They roast above two of my windows

on ledges of our roof.

Two weeks after moving in the skies clouded up and the bottom fell

out. Thats when I noticed the itching sensation. At first I thought

it was cat hair on my face. Strangely, my cat has never caused that

to happen to me in years past. The itching and tickling grew worse

every day. One afternnon I was sitting in a chair in the backyard

while wearing shorts. I felt the crawling sensation and examined my

skin. In a matter of less than a minute I killed a dozen tiny dark

spots that crawled very quickly on me. I was horrified. OHHHHHHHH

NOOOOOOO!!!!!!! BODY LICE!!!!!! I thought. i washed everything in the

house, including my dog and cat, then washed myself in RID (treatment

for lice). I thought I had solved the problem.

I spoke with the woman downstairs and asked her not to feed the

pigeons. She said that she had been being bitten ever since it had

rained. I told her that I was going to borrow aq pellet gun and kill

the pigeons.

When I got home from work last night I felt the crawling things on me

again and using a bright light saw several. I used the RID again and

HOT SHOT FOGGERS. It seemed to work. Upon getting home from work

tonight, all of a sudden I felt my new freinds crawling on me and saw

them again, though not as bad as before fogging.

The woman that feeds the pigeon lives below me. This morning she

called me at work desperate for relief. WHEN ARE YOU GOING TO KILL

THOSE PIGEONS I AM BEING EATEN ALIVE! She has welps on her, I do

not; but i now have sores in my scapl on the back of my head.

It seems as if the drop off of the ceiling on me. After reading the

information on your page I intend to try the vacuuming, bleach baths,

and ARRID EXTRA DRY treatment. This is like some biblical plague. I

went from no infestation to being over run with them in a day. I

think that the hard rain that we had washed them down all over the

building and stirred them up. It has rained twice since that first

visit with these creatures and the rain seems to make matters worse.

THIS IS WAR!

UPDATE

The landlord command is on this. The pest control people came out

today and sprayed the outside of the house with a barage of chemicals

then took samples of the mites to their command central lab to

determine exactly which control method would work the best. This

company has delt with bird mites before and stated that they are very

difficult to get rid of. I bought a pellet rifle today and killed

three pigeons and three squirrels while playing urban sniper. More

backyard seek and destroy missions to come. The squirrels have alied

with the pigen rebels and run across where the pigeons roost; then

they pick up the mites and spread them to other parts of the roof and

yard. I heavily bombed both my home, place of employment, and truck

yesterday. All leaves are cancelled until further notice to prevent

the contamination of any of our allied forces outpost. These Bombs

were used in a heavier strategic pattern bombing than the label

suggest and were left in the house for much longer than recommended.

We are also experimenting with night time bombing because this seems

to be the time when the mite invaders are most active inside of our

perimeter. So far things are better but I do not think the problem is

over,..only waiting for the reinforcements to come over the hill for

another scermish. Our troops have to hold our gained ground at all

cost and vigelance until more treatments can be applied outside and

in. Our only hope is that these efforts will occur before it rains

again and washes more mites down as happened in the initial attack.

Here,..in the trenches somewhere on the eastern front, as evening

decends, all is quiet for the evening except to the silence being

broken by the occasional pellet rifle shot and the gleam of our seach

lights peering through the thick fog of bug bombs insearch of enemy

mite scouts attempting to find a weakness in our defences. The night

sentry shot and killed two pigeons on their roast by spot lighting

them with a handheld floodlight. One escaped and flew off to warn his

conpanions; but we expect them to return in force at dawn. The troops

wanted to hang their heads on a pike in the yard as a warning to the

other vermin. The anger of our security forces is understandable; but

being their commander, I made the decision to pick the bodies up

using a garden tool and contain their remains in a plactic garbage

bag and then seal it. This body bag was not handled by human hands

but was rather carried to the dumpster using the garden tool to

protect the troops from recontaminating themselves from contact with

the bodies of the enemy. Another way that the enemy has attempted to

invade our permeter is by hiding in our mail boxes which hang on the

house underneath where the pigeon forces camp every evening. They

then ride into our houses on the mail and spring upon the troops

during daily mail call. Once this invasion method was discovered all

mail is handled with disposable latex gloves then sprayed before

entering our camp. All junk mail is disposed of and never is allowed

in camp as the mite invaders like to hide within the loose junk mail

pages and ambush us.

One warning about using the Arrid Extra Dry. Be extremely careful and

do not get this defence method into your eyes. One of our troops was

blinded for several hours because of this and another with repritory

problem almost lost his ability to breath from over exposure to the

powder in the spray. This method does help alot but makes the troop's

moral wane because they complain of feeling gritty after its

application. I supposed that it isnt necessary to put so much of this

spray on that members of the defence forces look like the Pillsbury

Doughboy.

Tomorrow morning, at dawn, the troops will attack the pigeon army's

home defense bunkers with barages of small arms fire and will place a

fake owl near their nesting place to possibly help ward of future

occupation by the insurgent forces. If these measures are

ineffective, spike strips will be installed along all ledges.

We all hope that the war ends soon and that we will all return to our

homes safely and with our sanity. Tell Mom I miss her and that

hopefully this thing will be over in time for us to be home by

Christmas.

For God and country, long live the republic!!!

Yours always,

Grits