UKH

So:

How midgey on Peak grit on Sunday? Temperature dipping but still and overcast.

(a) Really really grim

(b) Merely really grim

(c) Grim

(d) Mildy grim

(e) Hardly mildly grim

Climb on a north facing crag (into the wind) and you should be OK. 

D or E.

Leave before evening.

Ok, I'll place a bet: (b)

I'm pleased to report (e) hardly mildy grim

Unfortunately the fag end situation was: "copious dog ends and sweet wrappers abound".

I've been climbing twice a week around the eastern Peak through the summer holidays, and now I'm back to work, just once at the weekend. I've honestly hardly seen a midge all summer. I know they can be hellish occasionally. I've been chased up High Neb Buttress by them, and by my belayer's rising midge-induced panic, but that was 3 or 4 years back.

If it's really bad go to the limestone. But I keep seeing people talking about the midges. Not sure if I've just been lucky or they've been super unlucky?

Excellent, congratulations.
Curses on the litterers though, I hope the midges were leaving you alone because they followed the dirty bastards home and bled them dry!

I'd say it reached (c) for me in a field near Edale at about lunchtime today.  Grim enough that I declined a slice of free flapjack and legged it, but apparently not so grim that being liberally coated in Smidge wasn't enough to stop any of them actually biting me.

where was this? I wish litterers would just stay in their own filthy neighbourhoods.

Made the mistake of going to Dovestone Tor.  It was absolutely fine until the wind dropped at about 1pm, and instantly became a).

Pfft.... Ya wee jessies....

Lots of love,

the West coast of Scotland....;p

JESSIE, n. Sc. usage: a contemptuous expression for an effeminate man. 

I think that's an outdated and offensive slur we should get rid of from the language.

I took my partner up the West coast a couple of weeks ago. During preparation for the trip she'd been adamant that the mosquitos of her home in Wisconsin were far worse than any midge that could be encountered. How I chuckled.

She'd only encountered Northern English and lowland Scottish midges at this point. Sassenach midges, if you will.

Standing atop Bealach Na Ba at sunset, in head nets purchased on eBay that weren't quite up to the job, she turned and told me - through gritted teeth - how right I was.

Last weeks mid-week evening jaunt to Millstone they were bad enough to belay/second in a head net.

Sunday morning at Stanage they fine, no repellent or head nets needed. The swifts were about doing a good job of hoovering up the few that were there.

I have been "on the lime" most summer so have avoided any really grim belay stints!

That's just Highland willy waving, they're exactly the same beasties; Culicoides Impunctatus. 

The awfulness of the encounter just comes down to the numbers making a meal of you.  On a mercifully rare windless day it's possible for the experience of being eaten alive by Peak District midges to reach Glencoe levels of grimness.

Morning was OK at Stanage, but by the afternoon as the rain appeared they had come out with a vengeance...

I've been on Bealach Na Ba on an evening midge rush-hour.   One minute we were climbing happily then the light and wind dropped and it was totally mad.... like someone flipped an apocalypse switch. Luckily my locally purchased head net was with me and worked well. I never climb with exposed legs or arms during midge risk periods so the net and some gloves were enough. Those who hate climbing with socks will soon change their minds (or run away). 

Ahem! We'll have none of your outdated innuendo on here, please. Ooerr, Missus ....

Agreed. 

Of course they're the same insect - the North West Highlands just breeds them strong and plentiful 😁

As a Sassenach myself (from Stirling) I have no Highland willy to wave.

In all my years growing up, I had precisely one encounter with midges in central Scotland that compares to a fairly average experience in the North West Highlands.  

Glencoe is the Southern Highlands - the midge experience is not much worse than lowland Scotland, and I agree the North of England can be similar on an unlucky day. Head up past Torridon and is a different story though.