Have you spotted thrips on your houseplants or garden and are worried about thrips biting? You must know thrips bite humans and often cause small pink dots on skins without any sense and you can easily treat it with washing with soapy water. However, the Thrips bite can be hard for sensitive skin and those with allergies. hence keep reading to tell you more.
Here you will find everything you should know about thrips bite and the below questions answers:
- Do Thrips Bite me or my pets? Why?
- What are the thrips bite symptoms? How does it feel like?
- Is its bite dangerous? Do they transfer human viruses or other diseases to me?
- Can thrips live in my clothes? What things will attract thrips?
- How to prevent thrips bite?
- How to treat its bite?
So, keep reading to answer all your questions. Let’s get going.
What are the thrips on houseplants?
Before diving into the “thrips bite” subject, I will introduce them to you. If you are familiar with the Thrips on Houseplants, jump to the next part!
Thrips are common tiny white bugs in indoor and outdoor plants. They feed on the plants, so they can kill your lovely plants if you don’t kill them. Hence, if you spot them read “Thrips on Monstera” to tell you how to get rid of thrips on houseplants.
In the following picture, you can see these tiny white bugs, grab your magnifying glass and compare your culprits with the below image. However, if you want to know more about the symptoms of infested plants, thrips’ appearance and habits, read “Tiny bugs in houseplants”.
Thrips can bite humans!
Thrips feed on plants, they can pierce the outer layer of plant leaves and fresh stems by their mouthparts and suck its sap. Animals such as humans are not their food. However, there are reports of biting humans by thrips, why?
They attract to your skin because of your moist skin. Whether it is human or plant, they try to pierce the outer layer of the skin by their mouthparts and suck its moisture. Keep reading to tell you what are the symptoms of thrips biting on your skin.
What are the thrips bite symptoms? How does it feel like?
It is very similar to another insect biting:
- you will spot a small pink dot on your skin that will be changed to a red scar after some time.
- Most often it is without sensing anything.
- In sensitive skin, it may be along with itching or low pain with slight swelling.
- In people with skin allergy, it may cause symptoms such as sharp pain in the bitten area with inflamed and swollen signs on the skin.
Are thrips bite dangerous?
Indeed, a thrips bite is not dangerous and most people don’t feel anything after biting. However, if you have sensitive skin or allergies, you should meet your doctor after spotting the above signs.
In addition, there aren’t any reports of transferring human viruses or disease through thrips bite, although they carry many dangerous plant diseases. Hence, don’t worry about yourself, they are just threats to your indoor or outdoor plants.
Can thrips live in my clothes? What things will attract thrips?
Thrips are attracted to blue or yellow colours; hence they may be attracted to things like that such as your clothes. However, they can only feed off plants that love fresh parts of your houseplant and cannot live on your clothes.
How to prevent thrips bite?
If you have sensitive skin or allergies, in the following, you will find suggestions to prevent thrips and other insects from biting.
- Cover your body with loose-fitting and Long Clothes.
- Chemical Insect Repellent Spray:
They contain DEET or permethrin and will work well to repellent insects such as ticks, mosquitoes, fleas, etc.
- Natural Insect Repellent Spray:
Some natural oils that contain substances such as orange and cinnamon can be repellent insects like thrips.
You can also decrease the population of thrips by adding lovely ladybugs to your indoor or outdoor plants. read my other article “Do Ladybugs Eat Thrips?” to tell you more and show you how to do it. Another way to prevent Thrips bite is to prevent coming them to your house. I discussed it in my other post “The five main ways that thrips come from“.
How to treat the thrips bite?
If you feel a light itching on your skin, you can wash the area with soapy water. Most often it works well. In addition, the topical aloe vera gel can help you to relieve the itching. If you have very sensitive skin with inflamed and swollen signs you must meet a doctor.
Conclusion
Now, you found out the thrips bite humans because they are attracted to skin’s moisture and try to suck its moisture with their piercing-sucking mouthparts. However, the thrips bite is not dangerous and doesn’t transfer any human disease.
Hence, don’t worry about them. However, if you have sensitive skin, we showed above you how to prevent thrips bite and how to treat its bite.
Have you ever had any experience with thrips bite? How did it feel? Do you think the above remedy will work well? Do you have your specific treatment for thrips bite? Please share your experience and ideas with our readers below this page.
Elahe Rabiei
Hi, I’m Elaheh. My Academic major is plant protection, and houseplants are my expertise. As a houseplant lover, my house is full of indoor plants and it is my passion to take care of them. Hence, I’m here to share my knowledge and experience about growing healthy houseplants. I am also a plant protection advisor, so feel free to ask me any questions you may have.