BYGONE BIRDING: PLAGUE OF MOSQUITOES RUINED SIBERIA QUEST FOR DOTTEREL

                                                

Henry Seebohm (1832-95) - steel magnate, explorer and naturalist

Extract from Henry Seebohm's The Birds of Siberia to the Petchora Valley, first published in 1901.

A dotterel is very difficult to see through a mosquito-veil, and to lie down and become the nucleus of a vast nebula of mosquitoes is so tormenting to the nerves that we soon chose to adopt the consolatory conclusion that the grapes were sour and not worth the trouble of reaching after

Or, in plain words, that the birds had not begun to breed, and it was no use martyrising ourselves to seek their nests. 

The mosquitoes were simply a plague. 

Our hats were covered with them. They swarmed upon our veils. They lined with a fringe the branches of the dwarf birches and willows. They covered the tundra with a mist. 

I was fortunate in the arrangement of my veil, and, by dint of indiarubber boots and cavalry gauntlets, I escaped many wounds.

My companion was not so lucky. 

His net was perpetually transformed into a little mosquito-cage. His leggings and knickerbockers were by no means mosquito-proof. He had twisted a handkerchief round each hand, but this proved utterly insufficient.

Had it not grown cooler on the hills, as the sun got low, he would certainly have fallen into a regular mosquito fever. 

We were told that this pest of mosquitoes was nothing as yet to what it would become later. 

"Wait a while," said our Job's comforter, "and you will not be able to see each other at twenty paces distance - half a dozen regiments of mosquitoes will rise between you."