Pediculus Humanus Capitis, commonly known as head lice.  They are parasitic insects that live on the human head and survive by sucking the blood of their host.  Lice eggs are called nits, and they're laid by the adult female louse.  The nits are attached to the base of the hair shaft by a very strong cement.  They are located close to the scalp because they require body heat for incubation.

The average life cycle of the louse is 3-4 weeks.  Nit's take 7-10 days to hatch.  The hatched Nymph takes 7 days to mature into egg laying adults.  The female adults lay an average of 6 nits per day.

There are 6-12 million cases of head lice in the United States each year, and most of those cases are young children.  Lice are very contagious and are easily spread from head to head contact, as well as sharing brushes, combs, hats and other personal items.

The most commonly reported symptom of lice infestation is itching.  However it's important to note that many cases display no symptoms of itching at all.  Likewise many people have itchy scalps all the time, but never have lice.

Lice infestation is rarely dangerous, at it's worst secondary infections can develop from excessive scratching of the scalp and breaking the skin.

1. Lice do not jump or fly, they have no wings.
2.  Lice cannot live off of the human body for more than 48 hours.
3. Poor hygiene is NOT a factor in contracting Lice. They even prefer clean hair.
4. Dogs and cats cannot get or transmit lice.
5. Traditional chemical lice treatments are NOT 100% effective at killing live head lice and they are not effective at all in killing and removing nits (lice eggs).
6. If you have not removed ALL the nits from an infected head it is very likely that you will become reinfested.
7. By the time a Head Lice infestation is identified, you can usually assume that the infestation is already about 2 weeks old.