DCHP-1 Online

buffalo gnat † 

• a small, winged biting insect especially common in the northern woods, Simulium spp.

  See also: black fly  

  • 1843  (1868)  [Excessively annoyed by . . . buffalo gnats.]
  • 1897  In fact the mosquito, "buffalo-gnat" and "bulldog" seemed to have prairie appetities, and every traveller across these plains knows what that means.