Friends, Not Food!

When you fly over the feeding pits you will get surrounded by flies and dismounted after a few seconds. This is presumably to hinder you from just flying to the NPCs and click them.

I would imagine the intent was to use the stealth ability given to you by your companion.

There is a flaw in that logic though. There is nothing to stop you from mounting up and flying for a few seconds inside the pits so once you have spoken to one NPC you can mount up, quickly get out of the feeding pits, and circle around to the next NPC. They are located very close to the feeding pit edges so its very easy to just land next to them before you get dismounted. Make sure the big bugs are not close when you land though.

I am a nice kunchong, not a mindless eating machine.

If I am to change this image, I must first change myself!

Shado-Pan Trainees are friends, not food!

While flying over the feeding pits, you get a buff called "Swarming Insects". Note that it's a buff and not a debuff. All you have to do is click this buff off repeatedly and you can complete the entire quest without being dismounted.