Nits are the eggs that lice lay in your hair. Knowing what the nits look like and what kills the nits is essential to successfully fight head lice.
Nits are only apparently less of a problem than adult lice: although they are easy to spot, they are much more difficult to get rid of. Disregarded nits will turn into adult lice that will lay more eggs and the lice will get worse.
Hard data tell about the scale of the problem: an adult louse consists of eight to ten nits a day, from which the larvae begin to hatch in less than a week. Lice larvae are whitish brown in color, the size of a pinhead. They grow up quickly and begin to assemble the nits themselves.
Nits or dandruff?
Nit is easy to confuse with dandruff as it resembles dandruff in color and size. Both nits and dandruff have a characteristic white-yellow color, and their size ranges from 0.5 to 1.5 mm. However, there are some important differences.
While the dandruff is flat and irregular in shape, the nits are oval and convex with a sort of vent at the top covered with a movable "lid", the so-called the lid, which is pushed outwards as the larvae hatch. Dandruff is easy to shake out of the hair, nits cannot be pulled off easily.
The location is also slightly different: dandruff is located all over the head, while nits are best seen on the hair just behind the ears and at the nape of the neck, less often on the top of the head. Until they begin to develop into an adult louse, the nits do not move. It is only in the larval stage that they make the first clumsy movements, but the human is not able to see them with the naked eye.
How do I get rid of nits?
Female lice lay their eggs in a specific place in the hair: right at their root - so that the hatched larvae have the shortest distance to travel on their way to the skin. So that the nits do not fall off with the first movement of the host's head, the female attaches them to the hair with the help of sticky secretions she produces.
It is strong enough to bind the nits to the hair like cement so that the egg does not fall off the hair during washing, brushing or other care treatments. It is because of this discharge that it is not easy to get rid of nits from the hair. So many people try to peel them off first with a preparation that kills the nits - although this is not the casethe only method to get rid of nits, however, is the most effective, because applying a special liquid to the hair against lice and nits or washing them with a specialized shampoo prevents the parasites and their eggs from gas exchange: they die due to the lack of oxygen.
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Neither dry nits nor old nits usually fall off by themselves. Therefore, after such a treatment (which should be repeated with the frequency recommended by the manufacturer of the preparation), dead lice and dead nits must be combed out of the hair with a special comb with long, densely spaced teeth.
Nits can also be combed out of the hair with a special lice comb without using any anti-lice preparations first. This should be done carefully, strand by strand, starting at the base of the hair, where the nits are located. It is important to brush the nits over the spread out paper (or newspaper) - when they fall out, they must go to the bin.
Lice nits can also be pulled out of the hair by hand, but it is tedious and long-lasting.
It is worth remembering that if one person has nits in the house - usually children, because lice usually attacks kindergartens and schools - then all the household members should undergo prophylactic treatment against lice and nits.
Worth knowingDo dead nits shoot?If you are in doubt whether the nits have fallen out of the hair (and not the flaked skin), you can crush it to be sure (people with strong nerves do it with their fingernails) - during crushing the dead piece will make a characteristic "shooting" sound. Hence the term "shooting nits" or "bursting nits".