What Are The Chances Of Having Leeches and having them bite?

Question

There is a pond back into some woods that we own with a waterfall in Massachusetts. It looks pretty clean actullyy. (like lake water) It would be fun to swim in it and go under the waterfall, but I dont want to come out with leeches all over me. Is there a way to tell if there in there? and if they are, are they dangerous? Anyway of getting rid of them? What are the chances of having them?

Answer 1

you could try leaving a piece of meat tied to a ancor in the pond.  within a day you should se about every leech within the square mile around it,

jk there would be around 3 to 20

Answer 2

Leeches do not carry disease, and generally the leech bite does not hurt.  They have anesthetic saliva so you won't notice when they bite.  So, I would argue that mosquitoes are a lot worse than leeches, generally.  

If there are many leeches, you can make a leech trap and cut down drastically on their numbers:

http://www.state.me.us/dep/blwq/doclake/...

If you get a leech on you, here is how to remove it:

http://www.worstcasescenarios.com/scenar...

They live in shallow water.  I've only seen them twice.  The first time I didn't recognize them.  There were a lot of them, they looked like cutworms except for the round, toothy mouth that looked like a lamprey's.  I picked them up and handled them; apparently they weren't hungry.

The next time I saw a leech, it was a marine leech on the beach.  Marine leeches don't bite people, though.  In fact, most leeches don't.