If you live near the lake, you’ve definitely noticed them: massive swarms of mosquito-like insects crowding around lights and clogging spider webs.

“They’re always around,” Royal Ontario Museum entomologist Doug Currie says of the bugs. “It’s just a matter of when you have particularly large synchronous hatches that you notice them.”

Midges are part of the chironomidae family — a non-biting insect that closely resembles mosquitoes. Every spring and fall, millions of these pesky insects emerge from Lake Ontario to mate. While they’re completely harmless, their aerial orgy often means midges floating in patio pints or being inhaled on lakeshore bike rides.

“A little extra protein will never harm you,” Currie laughs.

There are hundreds of species of midges in the GTA, Currie says. Spending most of their lives in the water, they’re an important source of food for fish, birds, bats and invertebrates. Although they can be found in their highest concentrations by the lake, wind can carry them far north into the city. Attracted to light, they’re also particularly bothersome for condo dwellers.

“They’re just covering our sliding door screens and our furniture — you can’t really sit outside,” Brandon Rothberg says of his Parkdale condominium.

“When I went outside to get the barbecue ready the other night, it was disgusting — they were flying into my face and my mouth!”

“The spiders just have a field day with these things. But there’s so many now compared to the spring that the spider webs are collapsing under the weight of all the corpses.”

If, like Rothberg, you’re feeling sore about the swarms, be sure to keep your windows and doors closed and turn off patio lights. “But the smaller ones can sometimes work their way through screens,” Currie adds.

Midge season, however, won’t last much longer.

“We’re just talking a matter of a few weeks, typically. These are not really long-lived insects as adults.”