Adults live three to four months and produce about 10 to 12 offspring. Keds numbers in a flock are lowest during the summer and highest during the winter. They usually are spread from animal to animal by direct contact but keds can crawl to a new host. Keds can only survive off of the animal for about a week. Sheep keds are readily controlled with insecticide dusts or sprays.
Treatment is recommended immediately after shearing.
About half of the adult keds and most of the larvae are removed with the fleece and better coverage is obtained on shorn animals. Keeping the flock free of keds requires isolating and treating newly purchased animals before they join the flock. Sheep Nose Bots Adult sheep bot flies are hairy yellow-brown insects about the size of a bumble bee. They follow sheep on warm, still, sunny days from late spring until autumn. The flies dart at the sheep's head and deposit newly-hatched larvae near the nostrils.