Sharing the Woods and Waters: A Practical Guide to Bugs In Da UP

They live here. We're the visitors.

That's the frame I want to start with, because every conversation I've ever had with a guest about bugs starts with a slightly worried question and ends with us figuring out together how to share the islands gracefully.

I get it — nobody comes north for the insect life. But the Les Cheneaux happen to be a pretty hospitable place to be a human in bug season, especially on the water, and most of what people are afraid of either doesn't apply here, doesn't apply for long, or doesn't apply at all. Some of it is genuine and worth respecting. None of it should stop you from playing outdoors — the benefits to your body, mind, and soul far outweigh a few bites and a little planning.

Here's the practical version, by character.

Black Flies

Notorious — like Bonnie and Clyde, except with smaller getaway vehicles and a very different approach to your ankles.

A big problem in the Les Cheneaux? No.

We're south-facing, with mostly rocky shoreline, which works in our favor. Black flies are worse near sandy beaches and when southerly winds push them out of the woods. The western UP and the Lake Superior shoreline — places like Whitefish Point — get hit much harder than we do. Honestly, count yourself lucky you came east. Picture an outdoor screening of The Birds. That's western UP black flies in a bad year. That's not us.

A bit of biology, because it actually helps you plan: black flies emerge once stream water hits about 40-50°F, which usually means mid-May to early June around here. Cold spring? Later. Warm spring? Earlier.

One thing worth knowing: black flies go for the face, neck, hairline, and ears — the soft, exposed skin around your head. That's why a head net is one of the most genuinely useful things you can own up here (of course we sell them in the shop, we like to be prepared!). Long sleeves and DEET on your arms won't help you if they're chewing on your scalp.

While we're talking biology — almost all of the bugs that bite you are female, which means they're not coming for you out of malice. They need a blood meal to feed their kids. It's a single mother working a second job. The males are off on flowers somewhere being passive. So when you slap one and feel triumphant, just know: she was probably trying to do everything she could to improve her larvae's chances of getting that elusive generous college scholarship.

Mosquitoes

Almost never a problem on the water. Mosquitoes are lazy fliers, don't like crossing big expanses of water, and lake breezes don't do them any favors.

When you're going to hear that high-pitched whine is when you land at dusk after a sunset tour, or when you're hiking through woods with no breeze to keep them from landing on you. That's when you need a strategy.

For paddling, you really shouldn't have to douse yourself in repellent for the brief few minutes between water, helping us reload boats onto the trailer, and your vehicle. For hiking, come prepared — long sleeves, long pants, head nets, and a repellent with DEET. (Same toolkit works for ticks, which is convenient.)

A note on DEET concentration: the CDC recommends at least 20% DEET for tick protection, and around 20-30% for mosquitoes. Anything under 10% is basically a one-hour product. You don't need 100% — research shows protection plateaus around 50%. A 20-30% product is the sweet spot for most outdoor play. We carry Ben's at the shop.

If you prefer natural repellents, pack a backup. Biting insects in Michigan transmit some genuinely dangerous diseases and cases have been on the upswing (Lyme, West Nile, EEE), and the data on natural alternatives is mixed at best. Picaridin, oil of lemon eucalyptus (PMD), and IR3535 are all EPA-registered alternatives to DEET that work — those aren't "natural" in the home-brewed essential oil sense, but they are non-DEET. Otherwise: pre-treated permethrin clothing for those hating directly fogging their bodies or plan to shower after playing outdoors to remove the chemicals. Whatever strategy you'll actually use is the right one. Head nets, by the way, are a great chemical-free way to get outdoors — no spray, no skin reaction, no transferred-to-your-PB&J residue (I'm team crunchy).

Midges

Mid-May through early June, sometimes in clouds. You may accidentally eat one and likely won't find them as tasty as the birds do — or as tasty as the dessert on our Sunset Tours. But they're a sign of a healthy ecosystem, just like the mayflies. The ones you'll mostly encounter here don't bite. There IS a biting cousin (no-see-ums), which mostly turn up in the evenings near shore — easy to manage with a head net and long sleeves once the sun's getting low if you're in an area where they do make an appearance. They're often confused with black flies, since both are small and bite, but they're a different beast.

Either way: midge swarms look annoying. They're harmless. Move on.

Mayflies

Mayflies are the most theatrical bug in the Great Lakes. The big show in Les Cheneaux is the Hex hatch — Hexagenia limbata, also called the giant Michigan mayfly or simply "the hex." They're one of the largest mayflies in North America, with adults up to an inch long, and they're so abundant during peak hatch that swarms have shown up on Doppler radar (Lake Erie, 1999, 3 to 6 kilometers wide). Hex hatches in northern Michigan lakes peak from early June into early July. There are smaller mayfly hatches before the Hex — brown drakes, then mahoganies — but those are a what fishing lure/fly to use concern more than a windshield concern.

When there's a big hatch, they're everywhere. You'll drive through a cloud of them and your windshield will tell the story for the next month (FYI there's a self-serve car wash one block from our shop). You can hear their wings if the hatch is dense enough. It is, genuinely, one of the more remarkable sounds in nature.

My sister hates them. To be fair, here's why: a strong hatch means waking up to find the front of your cottage covered in exhausted mayflies hanging on for dear life. Their legs have these tiny Velcro-like hooks. So when they finally settle down after a night of, let's say, vigorous courtship, they cling to your siding — and getting them off is harder than peeling your kid off their smart device. (Which, frankly, is part of why we do this work in the first place.)

Up side: gulls love mayflies. After a big hatch you can find perched on dock pilings like an over-fed pride of lions watching the Lions on Thanksgiving — gorged, content, and barely able to fly. (For the curious: the Lions are 38-46-2 all-time on Thanksgiving Day. ) You can usually find a hatch by looking for the circling gulls. Nature's Las Vegas-strip neon sign.

For paddling, mayflies are a non-issue. They don't bite. They might land on you. Marvel at their wings. Pluck them gently off by grabbing them at their wing tips. Move on.

Stable Flies (a.k.a. Canoe Flies — make of that what you will)

These are the ones that earn their reputation. Mid- to late summer when it gets hot.

They prefer ankles but will happily go after wherever they can land — even through thin clothing. The bites hurt and itch like crazy, and you want to avoid them. Your repellent isn't going to save you here. To a stable fly, your DEET is just a condiment — the ketchup-or-gravy debate at a Yooper's pasty dinner. The fly's coming either way.

The fix is mechanical: long pants or tights, and we may still recommend a spray skirt to close access to your legs — sometimes we even just pack one in your boat without telling you, like a wise parent making sure the kid remembers PJs for the slumber party. The flies lose interest when there's nothing to bite. You win.

A pasty interlude

Brian's paternal family is all Finnish from the Keweenaw — Chassell on one side, Laurium on the other — so pasties are non-negotiable in this house. (However, I personally don't love them. There's no cheese.) Brian's paternal grandmother Edna passed in 2007 and her recipe is the one we still make (see below).

A few things worth knowing about a real pasty:

Rutabaga or no rutabaga? A whole denominational schism. Edna's recipe uses ¼ rutabaga, which puts her in the more traditional Cornish-mining-camp camp. Some families leave it out. Some die on this hill. I'm not getting in the middle of it but I like rutabaga. And parsnips.

Why shortening? Pasties were lunchboxes for miners. They needed to survive being carried into a mine and reheated on a shovel over a candle. Sturdy crust, not a delicate flake. Butter was expensive and produced a more tender, less durable crust — fine for a Sunday pie, wrong for a workday. Lard was traditional. Shortening came in later as the affordable, shelf-stable middle ground.

If you want to nerd out on the why, Alton Brown did an entire Good Eats episode about the science of crust (Crust Never Sleeps, 2000), in which he literally fights wrestling puppets named Tender and Flaky. Tender = butter (fat coats flour, prevents gluten). Flaky = lard or shortening (solid fat creates flaky layers when it melts).

Modern alternatives if you don't want to use shortening (FYI, in baking, fats can always be exchanged 1:1):

• Lard — most traditional, most authentic to the era. Comes back into vogue now and then. Best flavor. When at the grocer, keep an eye out for non-hydrogenated lard versus hydrogenated. The non-hydrogenated version is more "real" and similar to what your ancestors used to keep in a small crock by the stove.
  

• Butter — more tender, less sturdy. Works for a sit-down pasty, less ideal if you're hauling it down a mine shaft.
  

• 50/50 lard and butter — Alton's preferred blend. You get both characteristics.
  

Edna's Pasty Crust

• 5 cups flour

• 1 cup whole wheat flour

• 2 cups shortening (or modern alternative — see above)

• 2 tsp salt

• Water to hold together
  

Filling:

• 2 lbs meat

• 6-8 potatoes

• 1 large onion

• 6 carrots

• ¼ rutabaga
  

Makes about 8 pasties. Bake at 350°F for 45 minutes.

Edna's instructions for the dough were: "Mix until it feels right." She lived to be 94. I'm taking it on faith.

You might also find it useful to first brown and cook the meat (as it won't cook fully inside the dough and food poisoning is never fun), and chop all your veggies into half-inch pieces. Modern recipes will often encourage sautéing the veggies in the pan before cooking the meat too, to partially soften them and then be able to help flavor the meat. Use kosher salt to add something for your tastebuds to enjoy because otherwise these will be bland and needing ketchup or gravy for sure. You also need to roll out the dough to about 1/4" thickness and shape into 6-8" rounds; scoop 3/4 C of the combined filling onto one side; fold over and crimp the edges with tines of a fork to seal. Edna's recipe card doesn't mention any of this because Edna assumed you knew how to cook. The play-by-play is a modern courtesy.

Yellow Jackets

Late summer through fall. Mostly when it's warm and they're hunting protein and sugar for the colony.

Important note: leave your Faygo at the shop. (Yes, in Michigan it is pop, not soda. We have feelings about this. My maternal grandfather was an RC and Vernors pop distributor — back in the day, that meant he made the pop, bottled it, loaded his truck, and delivered a route throughout the greater Grand Rapids area. And yes, my mom drinks Vernors warm and flat for any number of ailments. Michigan penicillin. Vernors actually started in 1866 as a pharmacist's creation — James Vernor was Michigan's first licensed pharmacist, and the soda began as something he served from his drugstore soda fountain. So when your mom hands you a warm Vernors for a stomachache, she is, technically, observing a 160-year-old prescribing tradition. It also makes a respectable Detroit Mule when you've run out of ginger beer — it's a feisty ginger pop.)

Anyway — yellow jackets are particularly aggressive about anything sweet in the late season. They're trying to bulk up before frost. An open can of orange Faygo is basically a yellow jacket dinner bell. Closed bottles, water, and unsweetened drinks are fine.

If they show up at your lunch break, don't swat. Swatting them releases an alarm pheromone that calls in the others. Move calmly away from the food source, finish elsewhere if you need to. They will lose interest when you're not standing over a sugar buffet.

One serious note: if you have a severe sting reaction (anaphylaxis), bring your epi-pen on every tour and let your guide know before we head out. Yellow jackets are aggressive in late season and we want to be ready if a sting happens.

Ticks

Yes, they're out there — in the woods and on the islands. Both wood ticks and deer ticks. Lyme disease is a real concern in Michigan.

Always do a tick check after any tour, hike, or rental. Make it a habit, not an afterthought. Long pants tucked into socks, light-colored clothing if you have it, and a mirror or a friend at the end of the day. Permethrin-treated clothing works for the seriously concerned (lasts through several washes, kills ticks on contact).

Ticks don't actually jump. They climb up grass and brush, hold on with their back legs, and wave their front legs around — which have these tiny hooks — and literally catch a ride when something brushes by. It's called questing, and it's why most of them get on you from the knee down. Focus your spray on your boots, ankles, and lower legs and you'll catch most of them before they catch you.

One more thing: when you get home, throw your clothes in the dryer on high heat for 30 minutes. Ticks survive a wash cycle (water doesn't bother them much), but they don't survive heat. Dryer first, then wash if needed. This is one of the most effective and underused tick precautions out there.

The short version

Bugs are part of being outside in the UP — they live here, we're visitors playing in their living room. The list above isn't exhaustive (deer flies, horse flies, the occasional bee), but the realities are:

• On the water: rarely an issue. Lake breezes do most of the work.
  

• On shore at dusk: mosquitoes show up. Long sleeves and a head net solve it.
  

• Hot mid-summer: stable flies. Long pants and a spray skirt.
  

• Late summer through fall: yellow jackets at lunch. Don't bring sweet drinks.
  

• Always: ticks. Always: tick checks. Always: spray boots and ankles. Always: dryer on high for 30 minutes when you get home.
  

A little preparation and a little entomological understanding will go a long way in this Euchre tournament between insects and humans. The bugs aren't trying to ruin your trip. They're just trying to live their lives, raise their kids, and not get squished. Same as anyone else around here.