How many lice are able to live without a person

Lice are obligate and very highly specialized human parasites. They are absolutely not adapted to life outside his body or to other animals. Only in exceptional cases, lice can live and somehow multiply in the hair on the body of some monkeys, but here they feel much worse than in human hair.

The question of how much lice live without a person can be given a simple answer - just as much as they can withstand without food. And the issue of hunger for lice is very, very serious - Usually, a louse cannot go hungry for more than 2 days, and only when the temperature drops to 10-12 ° C can it stretch up to 10 days without food.

On a note

The pubic louse is even less enduring - it can starve at its normal 28-30 ° C for no more than 8-9 hours, and later this period will die if it does not reach the human body. But in the water lice, especially pubic, can survive for two days,and therefore they are often transmitted from person to person in public bathing places.

How many lice live, so much they continuously feed. Head lice are eaten 4 times a day, pubic - every 3-4 hours.

From the above considerations, it is easy to understand that lice cannot live long outside the head and in general - outside a living creature.

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Frequently asked questions of parents like “how many nits live” or “how many nits live without a person” are not entirely correct. Nits are not independent insects, but only lice eggseach in its own shell. Therefore, they do not live, but develop. Without a person, they retain their ability to develop for quite a long time - up to several days.

 

Specific nutrition lice and their dependence on the owner

The only food for all types of lice that are found in humans is the blood that the parasites suck, piercing the skin between the hair. It is wrong to assume that lice feed on the hair itself: some think so for the reason that head lice are often found to hold tightly to the hair.

The insect does such a trick only in order not to fall from the head during human movements, combing or washing hair.For nutrition, the parasite still has to go down on the skin, pierce it with its stylets and suck blood.

Each species and even each subspecies of head lice is morphologically very well adapted to its environment. The size and shape of the segments on the paws to capture the hairs, the shape of the body, even the general contours of the abdomen of the insect are designed to live on a person and even on a specific part of his body.

For example, some lice live outside the head - the clothes louse has adapted to life on clothes and crawling to the body of a person when he puts on clothes. A pubic louse settles exclusively on the pubic hair and armpits. Only in children can a pubic louse infect the hair on the head.

Head lice live not only on the head, but can crawl on the beard of men and even eyelashes. Although in general, the size of adult lice do not allow them to parasitize comfortably on too short hair.

In general, even on a person lice do not live long. If the insect does not fall off the head and is not poisoned with a special shampoo or kerosene, in the adult stage the louse lives a maximum of 40-46 days, the nymph develops an additional about 15-20 days. In general, the louse lives on the head for about two months, and on the pubis - about six weeks.

But go on animals human head lice can not. In laboratory experiments, they feed on the body of monkeys, but in nature they practically do not occur on primates. Therefore, these parasites cannot exist outside of man. The only exceptions are body licewho do not live on the human body, but eat all the same ...

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Their inability to endure hunger strikes louses are strikingly different from other parasites. For example, bed bugs can go hungry for months, and mites even up to several years. A flea in room conditions can fast for up to 4 months, and at low temperatures - up to 1.5 years. The lice in this regard are amazing, but instead of being able to starve, they received a high adaptability to life on the human body from evolution - almost no ectoparasite has such a high specialization.

 

And the louse is not adapted to life without a man!

Body structure and lice lifestyle indicate that during their evolution, they managed to fully adapt to life on man. Their paws have been modified so that they can do almost nothing except the implementation of the hooks by the hair.Mouth apparatus lice adapted only for bloodsucking.

But the adaptability of the lice's reproductive organs to the human body is most noticeable: the female lays an egg in a rich sticky shell, and does so only by moving along the hair. As a result, the egg remains attached to the hair. After exiting the egg, the larva immediately falls on the scalp and can feed.

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In nature, human lice do not live. The species close to them parasitize on primates, but it is the human parasite that is found exclusively on man.

Outside the person lice live only on his clothes. Thus, a special type of lice was formed, which can no longer live on the head, but are perfectly adapted to life on clothes (body lice). Here they lay nits, they mate here, and crawl over to a human body for food. Lice that live on clothes have a slightly different structure of the legs, allowing them to confidently hold on almost any textile products.

Interestingly, body lice, which live outside the human body, do not differ in longevity - their adult individuals live as much as head lice - about 40 days.Once outside the human body, the louse lives up to 3-4 days, and dies from hunger if the person does not wear clothes.

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In laboratories, scientists use rat blood to feed lice, or simply cultivate them in monkeys. Here, every louse lives without a person as much as it would live on the person himself.

But lice that live on animals have nothing to do with humans. Accordingly, it is impossible to get infected with pets from these parasites.

 

Dog lice

On dogs live specialized dog lice (more precisely - lashing). They have somewhat longer stilettos for piercing thicker dog skin, as well as legs adapted to be attached to dog hair. Dog lice can not parasitize a person, and even in cases where they accidentally fall on the head or body of a person, die within a few days.

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Dog lice belong to a family of eaters, somewhat different from typical lice. But, like lice, they differ in a narrow specialization and can parasitize only on one species of animals.

 

Cat louse and its features

The so-called cat louse, like the dog louse, belongs to the squad of biting lice and is adapted only to parasitism on cats. In all cats, these insects cause severe itching and skin lesions, and can also carry eggs of dangerous helminths.

For man cat lice not dangerous. Lice that live on cats cannot even stick to human hair.

 

Do lice live on pillows and blankets?

Of course, on the pillows and bedding lice do not live. If only because here they have nothing to cling to and nowhere to put off the nits.

In some cases, head lice may fall on the pillows from the hair of an infected person and stay here for several hours, waiting for the opportunity to crawl back onto the human head. Body lice may even settle in the folds of blankets and sheets, but these insects do not form permanent populations here.

But lice can easily be transmitted through towels, combs and scrunchies. To prevent infection, first of all you should check the hygiene products and the person with whom you communicate.

 

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