Russian Thistle Mites
written by: Lynne Phillips
November 2023
A high-pitched scream — unlike any sound I’d ever heard before — woke us. “What was that, Dan?” I asked.
“Sounds like someone in distress.”
We both strained to listen above the roar of the wind. When I heard it, I wished I hadn’t; an agonised, blood-curdling scream that didn’t sound human, but definitely distressed.
The lamp beside our bed wouldn’t turn on.
“Shit, another blackout,” Dan said. “Although I’m not surprised with that gale blowing. Probably poles down again.”
I reached for my phone and switched on the torch. Dan’s eyes, like black pools in a pale face, told me his heart was probably racing as fast as mine.
“We’d better investigate,” he said. I hesitated — I didn’t really want to face whatever made that sound— but nodded.
We pulled on warm clothes; there was a wild wind blowing outside again, and the temperature had dropped since we went to bed.
Despite the force of the wind, we managed to open the back door. Lying on the ground was a black shape. From the distressed braying, I knew it must be Clarence, our donkey, but it was difficult to accept the giant seething mass was our beloved pet. Except for his eyes — rolled back in his head — he was covered by a multitude of tiny black creatures, none bigger than the size of a pea; a moving, seething dark mass. He opened his mouth to bray again, and the creatures scurried into the gaping space. Our rescue donkey gave one more distraught choked shriek, shuddered, and died.
Dan and I took a step towards him, but recoiled as his body split open and a mass of scurrying creatures headed towards us. Dan backed off. I stood frozen on the spot. My head was blank as I tried to comprehend what just happened. This seething mass couldn’t be my beloved Clarence.
“Inside, now!” Dan yelled, pushed me back into the house, and locked the door. A few tiny creatures crawled in under the space between the door and the floor. Dan stomped on them, and I grabbed all the coats, rugs, and towels from the mudroom and jammed them under the door. With shaking hands and a hammering heart, I reached out to Dan.
“It was like Joe,” I said. A tear ran down Dan’s face. He pulled me to him. I don’t know whose heart was beating faster; his or mine, but I knew I would never get that scene out of my head. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw Clarence’s distress.
We boiled water on the gas stove and made coffee. Dan’s hands shook as he held the mug. Neither of us wanted to go back to sleep. Instead, we lit the fire and talked about our life before we brought the farm, holidays, happier times; anything so we didn’t have to dwell on the agonising death of Clarence.
As the sun rose, the electricity came back on. The wind had dropped. We opened the back door a crack and peered out. The tiny creatures had disappeared, having devoured the flesh from Clarence. Only a pile of bones — with a few pieces of flesh still attached — remained.
One of the barn doors had splintered, and there was a gaping hole where a distressed Clarence must have frantically kicked against it and clambered through. A trail of blood led to our back door. The other animals were huddled — a quivering, but silent bundle — in the far corner and were reluctant to leave the shelter of the barn. It took us hours to calm them and coax them outside.
When Dan drove into Kearney to get timber to repair the door, many other people had similar unsettling stories to tell; none as horrifying as Clarence, but all involving tumbleweeds and the tiny black creatures which the authorities had named mites. There seemed to be a link between the increase in tumbleweeds and the mites, but nothing had been proven. How they were connected was tenuous, but scientists were linking the two at this stage; their appearance together being more than a coincidence.
News bulletins warned people to lock their animals up at night. The authorities were baffled. There was no advice about how to treat wounds from the thorns effectively, or prevent the invasive tiny mites.
We buried Clarence beside the garden shed.
***
Four months earlier….
Wind rattled the windows as I tried to write. Dan poked his head around the door. “It’s hell outside,” he said. “I’ve made a cuppa. Ready to take a break?”
“Sure, I’m having trouble concentrating because of the wind.”
Dan handed me coffee. I yawned and saved my work. “Thanks, I needed that. I hardly slept last night with that wild storm, and the wind this morning is making it hard to think straight.”
“I slept through it all,” Dan said.
“Lucky you. I wish I knew how you did that. What have you been doing to get these on you?” I asked and plucked tri-pronged thorns out of his hair and brushed tiny spores of some organic material off his shoulders.
“Probably from the tumbleweeds. I couldn’t get the barn doors open this morning. There were so many tumbleweeds blown up against them; too many for me to just pull them away by hand. Besides, they were big and spikey.”
“What did you do?”
“Luckily, I’d left the tractor parked in the lean-to near the house last night because I didn’t want to get wet when that storm swept through. l hauled the tumbleweeds away with a grappling hook attached to the tractor. I suppose that’s how I got the prickles.” Dan shuddered. “You know what was weird? As soon as I released the tumbleweeds, they took off like they were possessed. It was very unnerving.”
“Not as bizarre as the news on the radio this morning. In Washington, state troopers had to dig out a dozen cars that were buried under tumbleweeds piled six meters high and almost as deep,” I said.
“How did that happen?’’
“The tumbleweeds were blowing across State Route 240. The cars slowed to avoid them, and the weeds kept piling up against them; pinning the cars against the road barriers. Apparently, people were hysterical, as if the tumbleweeds were actually attacking them. One man said they were so thick around his car it blocked out all the light, and he had difficulty breathing because the dust that accompanied the tumbleweeds was so thick it clogged the air. There’s a couple of conspiracy theories being touted. One is the tumbleweeds had developed sentience and are not dead weeds.”
Dan laughed. “The way they took off this morning, I can almost believe that.”
I grinned. “The theory I like best is the Russians or Chinese are controlling them like drones, and they are going to take over America.”
“Drones? They looked organic to me.”
“Did you know it was Russian immigrants who brought the seeds out here in the mid-eighteen hundreds? The plants are called Russian thistle over there, but aren’t a problem because of their bitter winters and poorer soils. Apparently, when the immigrants planted flax crops here, the thistles sprouted too. With our better conditions, the tumbleweeds thrived, and now they are all over America.”
“Even in the cities?”
“There were some in New York.”
“Do you think there are more tumbleweeds around the farm lately, or is it just my imagination?” Dan asked.
“Yeah, I noticed a lot more; and they’re bigger, too. One bowled into me when I was feeding the chickens yesterday. It knocked me off my feet and dragged me across the ground.”
I showed him a couple of grazes on my legs where the skin had been removed, being hauled along the stoney surface by a tumbleweed that was taller than me and two arm spans across.
“That looks a bit nasty, Roxie. It’s very red and raw.”
“It’s just a gravel rash, but I must admit, the force of the tumbleweed scared me. It would have dragged me further except I grabbed onto the pole near the shed. If that hadn’t been there, I could have been carried to the end of the gravel driveway and really been a mess.
“Gosh, please be more careful. You could have been seriously hurt.”
“It shook me up a bit. The force that tumbleweed hit me was massive; a kid would have been seriously hurt. I’ll be more vigilant in the future.”
Dan rubbed his arms. “This stuff is making me itch. I’ll have a shower and change my clothes.”
By the time we’d finished our coffee, the wind had eased. I went back to writing, and Dan went to have a shower. The topic of tumbleweeds didn’t come up again until two weeks later.
***
Dan and I had a smallholding on the edge of Kearney, a small town in Arizona. We left the city life behind after Dan’s heart attack. The doctor suggested it was stress-related, and aged sixty, maybe the pressure of achieving unreasonable goals was too much; Dan should consider changing jobs or retiring if he wanted to live to be an old man.
The timing was perfect. There were redundancies with his firm, Pratt Electronics, because of a merger between his company and some other high-tech corporation. Taking the opportunity for a payout, and using some of our savings, we purchased ten acres where we raised goats, chickens, Clarence, a rescued donkey, and one newly acquired, obese sow named Priscilla. The farmhouse was old, but solid, and had a large red barn to shelter the animals in bad weather. We grew maize and sorghum to feed the animals, and vegetables for us, because Dan took up the doctor’s warning to change his lifestyle, and went vegetarian. The goats provided milk, and we sold the surplus eggs to Sunday drivers passing by.
Being an investigative journalist, I could be based anywhere, so was happy to make the move as long as I had a space to write and good internet connections. I thought it was a chance to write the thriller novel that I’d started. It had been sitting on my laptop demanding to be finished, but I’d never found time to complete. Not only did I finish that one, but managed two more. Three years later, the sales from my latest psychological thriller skyrocketed, and a small film company took an option to turn it into a four-part mini-series. This was a lucky break because living off the land was more expensive than we envisaged, and our savings had dwindled. Apart from the nuisance tumbleweeds, life on a small acreage was rewarding. We enjoyed being part of a small community and had made new friends. We both enjoyed working in the fresh air, and Dan’s health improved.
***
While we were eating dinner, a fierce wind whistled around the house. It rattled the windows and roared so loudly I could hardly hear Dan speak.
“It sounds worse than last time,” I said, and shuddered.
“Looks like I made the right decision about the animals,” Dan said.
In response to my puzzled look, he explained the weather looked ominous, so he had put the animals in the barn for the night. “All except Priscilla. She refused to budge out of the mud, and she’s too heavy to argue with, so I left her there.”
Priscilla was a recent acquisition; a fat sow. We were hoping to borrow our neighbour, Joe Mason’s boar, and maybe raise some piglets for the market. Obese and stubborn, she was more than both of us could handle if she refused to cooperate. I could understand why Dan acquiesced and left her there.
“She’ll hunker down in the mud. We’ll check on her in the morning.”
“I suppose so,” Dan said, but I could see he was worried about her.
When I drew the curtains, hoping to block out some of the sound, the debris — the wind was carrying — was so dense, everything outside was obliterated from sight; I couldn’t see the barn. It was eerie and unsettling.
***
The radio the next morning reported the dust was so thick people were presenting at the emergency department with asthma or other respiratory problems.
“They’ve been dubbed devil winds,” the reporter said. “In places, the damage was as severe as a tornado.”
That seemed a bit exaggerated to me, but when I went to open the back door, a wall of tumbleweeds and accumulated debris prevented it from opening.
“Dan, could you help me, please?” I yelled above the sound of his electric shaver. It took both of us — with our shoulders against the door, and pushing with all our strength — to get the door open enough to squeeze through. We were unable to speak for several seconds when we saw the devastation. The wind had ripped a three-metre-wide slice through our farm. Between the house and the barn and beyond, all vegetation had been stripped away. It was as if a construction crew had graded a section for a new road. The barn was still standing, but we could only see the tip of its roof. Tumbleweeds — piled on top of each other — obscured it.
The animals in the barn were making a ruckus, wanting to be let out and fed, or maybe just traumatised by the events of the night.
“Another job for the grappling hook,” Dan said, and then swore when he remembered the tractor was in the barn. “They’ll have to wait. It will be a task and a half by hand.”
“Come back and have breakfast, and then I’ll help you,” I said, but I wasn’t hopeful it was achievable.
We were finishing our coffee when Dan remembered Priscilla. “We’d better check on her,” he said.
Once again, we squeezed through the half-opened door.
There was no sign of our fat sow. The mud was churned and splattered everywhere. Her tin-roofed, wooden shelter had disappeared too, along with the enclosure. We searched the whole ten acres, but she was nowhere to be found. “Shit, I should have persevered,” Dan said.
My mobile was ringing when we returned to the house. It was our neighbour, Joe Mason. Phone calls from Joe are rare. He is a man of few words, so I knew it was important. I pressed the speaker button so Dan could hear the conversation.
“Your sow was blown onto my property in that devil wind last night,” Joe said. Before I could ask if she was alright, he told me her neck was broken when she fell to the ground.
Joe’s farm is several miles away from ours; it must have been a powerful wind to take her that far.
“Do you want me to butcher her for you?” Joe asked.
Apart from now being vegetarian, there was no way we could eat Priscilla; she was our pet. We arranged for Joe to butcher her for his family and bartered for another of his sows in return.
“I only have a smaller, younger one,” he said.
Dan laughed. “That’s okay. Maybe a smaller one would be easier to handle. I’ll need to build a new shelter and enclosure before I get her. If that’s okay.”
“No problem. What about your other animals, how did they fare in that wind,” Joe asked.
Dan explained the other animals were upset but safe in the barn, and why cantankerous Priscilla wasn’t. I told Joe about the destruction the wind caused, the bare strip through our farm, and the tumbleweeds piled against the barn. Dan asked to borrow Joe’s tractor to pull them away from the door, so we could let the animals out because our tractor was inside the barn.
“That seems strange. I only have minor damage,” Joe replied. “There is a pile of tumbleweeds clogging up my dam that I’ll have to pull out, but they can wait. I’ll bring the tractor over soon.”
***
Joe arrived a half an hour later. Joe doesn’t show much emotion, so Dan and I were surprised by his reaction to our situation. “Strewth,” he drawled, and crossed himself. “I thought you were exaggerating. That sure was a devil wind. It’s taken at least six inches of soil, and I’ve never seen so many tumbleweeds, and they are bigger and pricklier than any I’ve seen before.”
He was right. Up close, they were different from the tumbleweeds that usually rolled through our property; even bigger and thornier than the one that had bowled me over. The frantic cries of the animals in the barn were unsettling as we debated where to begin to clear the tumbleweeds; there didn’t seem to be any way the tangled mesh of sharp weeds could be separated.
Joe tried to wrap a chain around the nearest one. “Ouch, that bloody thing hurts!” he cried. A large thorn was embedded in his arm. He pulled it out and grimaced as blood appeared. He wiped it on his trousers. It left a long smear of blood.
I got the first aid kit and was surprised how red and swollen his arm was as I cleaned it with antiseptic and placed a band-aid on it.
“That doesn’t look good, Joe. I think you’ll need medical attention for it.”
“Don’t fuss, woman,” Joe said, and threw a grappling hook into a tumbleweed.
It took us two hours to move enough tumbleweeds to clear the barn door. Stoically, Joe didn’t complain when several more thorns pierced his arm. They didn’t bleed like the first one, but each left a large red weal, and I noticed him scratching at them.
Dan and I heaved the doors open. The barn was eerily quiet. Dust and tiny spores clogged the air. I pulled my t-shirt up to cover my mouth and nose. Dan wasn’t as quick-thinking. As the dust entered his lungs, he started coughing. His breathing was ragged, and his lungs emitted a harsh wheezing sound as he staggered back outside to catch his breath. I looked through the dusty haze at the devastation, and my heart missed a beat. At least half a dozen dead chickens littered the floor, and the rest looked like they would soon be gone too, as they staggered around. I chased them out of the barn, hoping the cleaner air would revive them.
Our usually noisy donkey stood leaning against the wall, his eyes glazed and head hanging down.
“Come, Clarence,” I said and led him outside. Joe found a bucket and filled it with water. He handed it to Dan, who drank in great gulps before holding it out for Clarence. After a long drink, Clarence revived and wandered away; seeking food. Dan stopped coughing — although he continued to wheeze — and returned to the barn with me.
“Pull your shirt over your face,” I said. “The spores and dust are still thick in places, although it is clearing a little bit now the doors are open.”
The four goats were huddled against the far wall; noses together. They were weak, but alive. Maybe they fared better because they’d faced away from the dust. Dan and I carried them outside, and Joe gave them a drink.
“I’ve lived here all my life, and I’ve never seen anything like this before,” Joe said. I noticed him scratching his arm, but when I offered to clean it again with antiseptic, he waved me away.
“I have to get back home. The missus wants to go into town shopping.”
“Thanks for coming over and the use of your tractor, Joe,” Dan said, before a coughing fit prevented him from speaking.
I waved to Joe and hooked my arm through Dan’s. “Come inside and I’ll make us a cuppa.”
Dan used his asthma puffer, and the coughing subsided.
Later, we checked on the animals. They all seemed to have recovered. We buried the dead chickens and used the grappling hook and tractor to pull the rest of the tumbleweeds away from the barn and left them in a huge pile.
“What are we going to do with them?” Dan asked.
“Not sure. I guess we could burn them. I’ll Google ideas later.”
Dan used the plough to rough up the area where the tumbleweeds had removed the grass. I sowed grass seed on it, but laughed; it was probably a waste of time as every bird within range arrived to eat the scattered seed. Dan spent the day constructing an enclosure for our new sow. He found the sheets of corrugated iron from Priscilla’s shelter blown up against the windbreak at the far edge of our property, along with a great tangled mass of giant tumbleweeds.
“I had to move a lot of tumbleweeds to get to the iron,” he said. “Some of their thorns are as big as my thumb.”
“At least you didn’t get pricked. Joe’s arm looked nasty. I hope he took my advice and had them looked at by a doctor.”
Dan was still wheezy and used his asthma puffer again before we went to bed.
***
We rely on our smart phones for everything, but hadn’t disconnected the landline; which the previous owner preferred. It was ringing before we were awake. Maybe it was my imagination. The ring sounded shrill, but not as piercing as the voice on the other end of the line. It was Mavis Johnson, and her voice was bordering on hysteria. “Roxie, Dan, we need help. It’s Joe. His arm, which was pricked by the thorns at your place yesterday, is swollen and turning black. He has collapsed. Please come.”
“Mavis, have you called 911?” I asked.
“Yes, and they are on their way, but I’m so scared. I think his arm will explode; the skin can’t stretch much further.”
“We’re on our way.”
It only took six minutes to reach their farm. The paramedics were already there, but it was too late. Joe’s heart couldn’t handle the stress, and a massive heart attack had taken him. The medics administered the paddles, but even though Joe’s body arched, his heart didn’t respond. After three tries, the paramedic shook their heads.
Mavis wailed, “Joe, Joe. Not my Joe. How will I cope without my Joe?” I wrapped my arms around her, held her close as her body heaved with grief, and moved her away so she couldn’t see Joe’s body.
I saw Dan’s eyes widened “Shit. What the hell!” he said. Joe’s arm had split open, and thousands of tiny insect-like creatures burst out. They were devouring Joe’s flesh; half his arm was devoured within a few seconds.
I grabbed Mavis’s arm, steering her towards the house. She protested; not wanting to leave, but she didn’t need to see that; she was already on the edge of collapse. I made her a cup of tea and she quieten enough to give me the number for her son and her doctor. The doctor arrived first and gave Mavis a sedative. By the time her son, Jack, arrived to collect Mavis, the paramedics had taken Joe’s body away.
“What happened after I took Mavis inside?’ I asked Dan as we drove home.
“I’ll tell you later. I need a stiff whiskey first,” Dan said, and turned to face me. From the haunted look on his face, I wished I hadn’t asked.
“If it’s too upsetting, you don’t need to tell me,” I said, but my investigative nature was curious. I really wanted to know.
He nodded “I’ll tell you, but I need time to process it. We’ll talk after dinner.”
Dinner was sombre. Neither of us was hungry. I made grilled cheese on toast and hot chocolate. We took it into the living room to eat it. Dan’s face was still pale and there were dark rings under his eyes. Curled up together in front of the fire, I could hear his chest still wheezing. After half an hour, Dan poured us each a tot of Whisky. I felt his body relax a bit.
“Are you sure you want to know?” Dan asked.
“I think so.”
I felt Dan’s body tense, but his voice was steady.
“After you left, the mass of creatures swarmed up Joe’s body, devouring it as they went. I frantically tried to get them off him and kill them, but there were too many, and they were moving up his body quickly, devouring as they went. Soon his face was a seething black mass.
The younger paramedic dry retched as the creature devoured Joe’s face. Luckily, the older guy — obviously had seen worse — reacted quickly and sprayed Joe with a can of anaesthetic, which killed some of the creatures. He grabbed a container out of his kitbag and scooped up som,e and we stomped on the rest of the escaping creatures. He said he’d get them analysed.
“That’s awful, Dan,” I said, “I’m sorry I asked. Are you okay now?”
“Yeah, but the image will remain in my head for a long time, and I feel responsible if helping us caused Joe’s death.”
“Me too.”
That night, we both had a restless sleep as Dan’s cough kept us awake. Nothing he swallowed eased it, and his asthma puffer wasn’t effective. We both woke tired and irritable. It had blown a gale again during the night. Once again, the tumbleweeds were piled up against the barn. Dan sighed, “At least I had the forethought to leave the tractor in the lean-to,” he said.
The tumbleweeds were larger, thornier, and harder to move. It took us the rest of the day to remove them. I’d googled how to destroy them, but the suggestions weren’t hopeful of success. We chose to burn them, but it proved to be more difficult than we expected. The thick stems refused to ignite, even with a generous application of kerosene. Some of the thorns sizzled and released tiny spores into the air. Once again, Dan was overcome by coughing. He used his puffer, but the wheezing became so debilitating we considered going to the emergency department. Several cups of tea later and more puffs, it eased.
We weren’t the only ones having trouble with the tumbleweeds. The hospitals were crammed with respiratory cases and incidences like Joe, where thorns had penetrated the skin. The tiny creatures were identified as some sort of mite; not previously seen in America, but definitely infesting the tumbleweeds. A general bulletin was issued warning people to be careful when handling the tumbleweeds.
***
Several weeks passed without incidents. The pile of tumbleweeds beside the barn shrivelled and dried, and we were able to burn them. They burnt with an intense blaze, and tiny motes floated in the air.
“I feel like my lungs are on fire,” Dan said, and had another coughing fit. I sent him inside while I tended to the fire. It was several hours before the air cleared.
***
For several weeks, there were no wild winds and only a few tumbleweeds rolled through our farm.
Arriving back late from the local Autumn Fair, we were tired. The weather was mild, so we left the animals out.
The next morning, tumbleweeds were once again piled up against the barn. “That’s strange. I didn’t hear the wind,” Dan said.
“We were both exhausted. I’m not surprised we slept through it. I hope the animals are okay.”
Sylvia, our new pig, was safe and wallowing in the mud. The goats and chickens were huddled behind the barn. They looked stressed, but revived when fed and watered. Clarence must have been slow to seek shelter. He had several large thorns embedded in his rump, and his hide was scratched, and the wounds were weeping. “Shit,” Dan said, and removed the thorns. Clarence brayed a long, mournful sound that brought tears to Dan’s eyes. “Sorry, Clarence. We’ll put you all in the barn at night from now on,” he said.
When Clarence brayed again, it put my teeth on edge. I cleaned the scratches and the area where the thorns had penetrated and applied anti-bacterial ointment. I checked on him before we went to bed. The wounds were slightly raised and red, but Clarence didn’t flinch when I cleaned the area again and applied more cream.
“Hope he’ll be okay,” Dan said as he closed the barn with the animals — including Sylvia, who had to be dragged out of the mud — safely inside.
December 2023
The trauma of Clarence’s death was still raw, but with Christmas approaching, Dan and I tried to put it behind us. We set up the tree, bought each other presents, and sent greetings to our friends.
Dan couldn’t get rid of the cough, and his body itched. The doctor prescribed a steroid puffer and creams. He booked him in for more tests — including a chest x-ray — the following day.
That night, Dan coughed so much I couldn’t sleep. I went into the spare bedroom. I woke to a blood-curdling scream. My heart thumped wildly in my chest. It took me a few seconds to realise where I was in the dark and a few more to find the light switch and rush to our bedroom. The sound was coming from Dan, but how he was still alive and able to make a sound was inexplicable. His chest had split open, and thousands of tiny mites scurried out. His head thrashed from side to side, Like Clarence, his eyes had rolled back into his head. “Roxie, run,” he whimpered. His body spasmed, and he lay still.
“Dan!” I sobbed, but then I saw the seething mass moving towards me. His words connected to my confused brain. I turned and ran.
- Russian Thistle Mites - July 26, 2025
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