If your part of the country doesn't have them, count your blessings. These mounds of granulated clay look harmless, inert, until you knock the top off of one. Just beneath lie thousands of agents of suffering.
They take over a field faster than kudzu. They've been rumored to eat the eggs of certain gallinaceous birds. Every living thing is supposed to have some value to the planet, but I've yet to find the good done by this tiny demon.
Water doesn't drown them. Bug spray doesn't deflect them. They move quickly and in silence.
They invade a boot without warning and those at the front of the charge wait until those at the rear have arrived to begin the assault. And then they bite. And it stings. And then itches for days.
Often they don't stop at boot level, ascending a leg until well past the knee only to release their venom in the most inconvenient of places.
I take great pleasure in their demise.
