Sheep ked
The sheep ked is a funny little fly that has no wings at all. It is brown and hairy and looks a lot like a tick. It spends its whole life hiding in the woolly coat of a sheep.
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Fun facts
Its legs are very strong and end in little claws, so it can hold on tight in the wool.
A mother ked does not lay eggs. She grows one baby at a time inside her body and feeds it with a kind of milk.
The baby turns into a hard, dark case glued to the wool. About three weeks later a new ked climbs out.
If it falls off its sheep, a ked can only live for about a week.
Farmers can get rid of many keds just by shearing the sheep's wool.
Most asked questions about Sheep ked
?Is a sheep ked a tick?
No. It looks like one, but it is a wingless fly. A ked has six legs and a real tick has eight.
?What does a sheep ked eat?
It drinks the blood of sheep.
?How big is a sheep ked?
It is only about 4 to 6 millimetres long, about as big as a grain of rice.
Myth buster
Myth: The sheep ked is a kind of tick.
Truth: No. People sometimes call it the sheep tick, but it is a fly without wings. It has six legs, while a real tick has eight.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Melophagus ovinus
- Group
- Flies and mosquitoes
- Family
- Hippoboscidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Diptera > Hippoboscidae
- Lives on
- Europe, Africa, Asia, Australia and Oceania, North America, South America
- Also known as
- Sheep tick
Where the facts come from
- Melophagus ovinus (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
- Picture by Acarologiste. CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons. The round sticker of this bug is cut from the same picture.
If we got something wrong, sorry, we are bug fans, not a science journal. Tell us at [email protected] and we will fix it.
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