Black flies bedevil Spokane

SPOKANE, Wash. – Another damp spring has led to another outbreak of black flies in Spokane.

Kim Papich with the Spokane Regional Health District says they're fairly new to Spokane after decades without the blood-suckers. Papich says the flies cut a hole in the skin to feed and it makes the bite bleed.

KXLY reports black flies are most common around ponds and streams, especially at dawn and dusk. They usually go away with the summer sun.

"My son Jack had a few bites at the baseline of his neck where his hair starts," mom Deanna Thornton told KXLY. "You don't see the fly so you don't really know what bit them to have that happen."