SO far, the weather this month has been glorious, nearly always hot with just a few humid days.

People throughout the district have been enjoying the weather and have chosen to visit some of the numerous nature reserves in the area.

However, the warm almost thundery weather has suited one rather unpleasant creature a bit too much, especially as this creature views people as food.

This beast spends the winter living in moist, muddy places as an egg. Then in spring it hatches out into a tiny, (just a few millimetres long) pale, slender, worm-like maggot.

At this stage it spends most of its time harmlessly thrashing its body through the dead and decaying leaf litter, looking for other small invertebrates to eat.

As conditions start to dry out, the maggot pupates for a couple of weeks in the soil before emerging around this time of year as the far more sinister adult.

The adults have only two things on their mind - reproduction and finding enough nutrition to produce their broods of young.

Unfortunately, this creature's idea of nutrition is the blood of mammals.

To find food, this creature has been equipped with antenna, which pick up mammalian scents.

It flies silently towards the scent, then uses its sense of sight for the final attack. These creatures have amazing irridescent eyes, which they use to select what looks like a particularly blood-rich spot on their target animal.

Their usual prey is a horse - from which they get their name - and cattle.

For both these beasts the best angle of attack is to sweep up and attach to a pale underbelly area away from any dangerous swatting tails. The creature then unsheaths a razor-sharp blade-like mouthpart, which it uses to cut into the flesh, and then drains its victim's blood.

This creature, which of course is the horsefly, also sees us humans as food and will attack if given the opportunity.

Usually, they will head for a light coloured area of skin or clothing, so beware as they have a painful and irritating bite.

When you do see and swat them, you have to hit them hard as unlike mosquitoes they have heavy body armour, which protects them from all, but the hardest direct hits.

Horse flies seem to have thrived on almost all the nature reserves this year, as the weather conditions seem to have suited them. Eventually though, the balance will be redressed and these creatures will go back to being an occasional sighting.

Until then, keep an eye out for these irritating insects.