So I was out back with the hedge trimmer when I felt a pain in my hand before I could even say “WTF?” Actually, I got out “WT” but couldn’t get the “F” in in time. Sort of like
‘…what the FUCK?!?!?!’
The usual suspect: wasps. I’ve had them in this place since I moved in but I’ve never been stung. For those of you who have never been stung and would like to replicate the sensation…
Take a needle. In that fleshy part where your thumb meets your hand, jab it in about halfway.
Thanks. I think it should be a really really fine needle. Like say, when you’re changing a guitar string and jam the B or E into your skin by accident.
Those fuckers are evil. They attack you! What the hell? I was out minding my own business one day and got dive bombed by one. Stung my ear! So I thought it was a fluke, because of that “they’re more afraid of you than you are of them” bullshit. So I go back out, because I needed something out of the yard, and they attacked me again! I run back in screaming, my ear swollen, freaking out. Later my husband goes outside (we still didn’t have the tool we needed in the first place) and they attack him, too.
For three days my ear and neck were very, very painful. I could barely move my head. Kill them all, I say.
Some palliatives.
Do the Jesus thing. Spit in some mud, make a slurry, apply. Right here right now (unless you’re surrounded by tarmac).
Apply meat tenderiser, papain or MSG as a paste.
During one day of gardening I got stung twice. Once in the hand by a little mini-wasp hiding in a weed vine I was pulling off the fence and another by a full-sized wasp in the back of the leg that had a nest in a palm tree I brushed up against as I walked past it. After that one I decided I had enough gardening for the day. I hate them also, they always nest in bad places and either end up squeezing through my window screens and getting in my house or being somewhere I walk past on a regular basis.
I don’t like using insecticides outdoors but I make an exception for wasps. I buy the wasp & hornet spray with a 20 foot spray, spray the nests and run like hell. You’re supposed to spray at dawn or dusk so you can get all the little bastids at home.
1.0 Sweat bee: Light, ephemeral, almost fruity. A tiny spark has singed a single hair on your arm.
1.2 Fire ant: Sharp, sudden, mildly alarming. Like walking across a shag carpet & reaching for the light switch.
1.8 Bullhorn acacia ant: A rare, piercing, elevated sort of pain. Someone has fired a staple into your cheek.
2.0 Bald-faced hornet: Rich, hearty, slightly crunchy. Similar to getting your hand mashed in a revolving door.
2.0 Yellowjacket: Hot and smoky, almost irreverent. Imagine W. C. Fields extinguishing a cigar on your tongue.
2.x Honey bee and European hornet: Like a matchhead that flips off and burns on your skin.
3.0 Red harvester ant: Bold and unrelenting. Somebody is using a drill to excavate your ingrown toenail.
3.0 Paper wasp: Caustic & burning. Distinctly bitter aftertaste. Like spilling a beaker of hydrochloric acid on a paper cut.
4.0 Tarantula hawk: Blinding, fierce, shockingly electric. A running hair drier has been dropped into your bubble bath.
4.0+ Bullet ant: Pure, intense, brilliant pain. Like fire-walking over flaming charcoal with a 3-inch rusty nail in your heel.
The long-distance sprays work well if you can see the nest.
My back yard has been made into a No Wasp Zone with a couple “Rescue” traps. They’re slime yellow/green plastic cylinders with an inverted funnel inside, and be sure to get the big bait cartridges (roughly the size of a fat thumb). For some reason, the little packet of bait and cotton ball the traps are packed with doesn’t work all that well.
Don’t bother with anything else. I’ve tried other traps, and these are the no-fail nuclear option. Hang them from a tree branch or fence post away from the house or patio.
Just as a coincidence, I cleaned them out and replaced the baits last night. Already, each one has a dozen wasps stuck inside. When you need to clean them out, ten seconds in the microwave will finish off any live wasps so you can open it safely.
Better them than us, and cheaper than epinepherine.
Four years ago I had a wasp sting on my right calf (it went up my pant leg) which resulted in a large and hardened lump under the skin. It lasted for weeks! I was still cleaning houses at the time and didn’t have any insurance. Took forever for the lump and its attendant stiffness and swelling to go away. I guess I’m still allergic like when I was a kid.
When I was 16 or 17 I got stung on the ankle by a wasp. I was a Counselor in Training at the time and within ear shot of a bunch of seven and eight year olds. I had to calmly go into the arts and crafts building and get the first aide kit without freaking any of the younger campers out. My natural reaction was very similar to yours. I held back though.
I spent the next week doped up on benedryl with a swollen, bruised ankle. I was the camp freak show. On the plus side, I got to wear flip flops on account of how swollen my ankle was.
I think he got me multiple places. A good three inches away, above the wrist, it feels like a nasty bruise. There was another bite, nearer my thumb, that wasn’t a problem fifteen minutes after the attack. Gah! Rat bastards!
I had one fly inside my shirt while I was laying concret block. I don’t remember how I got down from the scaffolding.
I used a chewed up cigarette to poltice a child’s sting once, and it worked very well.
One nailed me in the loft of the barn on the back of the neck. I grabbed him, and he nailed the web of my hand twice. He made a wonderful sounding splat when he hit the wall and slid down dead. My stiff arthritic neck was without pain for quite some time. Maybe it was the vigorous movement I mad rather than an effect of the venom.
One of my Zoo Profs got stung by a Tarantula Hawk Wasp- the swelling was the size of a baseball, well half a baseball. :eek:
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carnivorousplant **:“My stiff arthritic neck was without pain for quite some time. Maybe it was the vigorous movement I mad rather than an effect of the venom.”
There is some discussion that bee stings can reduce arthritus pain. :eek:
When I was a kid, I stepped in a yellow jackets nest while walking through the forest at night. Here’s a bit of information most people don’t know. When the yellow jacket stings you there is a bit of chemiluminescence. I’ve never seen any mention of it anywhere, but I clearly remember the flash of light as they stung my leg.
Strangely, I haven’t reacted to a bee sting in 20 years. I’ve been stung, but no welt. Could be luck, could be I’ve developed a tolerance from that early massive exposure.
Update: the area of the bad sting, at the base of the thumb, started acting up today when I was swinging a hammer. It’s back to normal. Up the wrist/opposite side still feels like a combination between a tender bruise and a sunburn, however.
Fact I stumbled across some time ago: wasps kill bees. Would it were the other way around.
Related, and I post it whenever I have an excuse: “Oh the beemanity!”
If you can read the dope at work, this ought to be safe…no questionable images but some words like “fuckin bees” might be objectionable.
I grew up ona farm, and the neighbouring farm had an apiary. We were on good terms with them and refrianed from using toxic pest controls for insects, which got us a few quarts of very nice clover honey every year,
By the time I was 14, I developed a “trick” in which I would snatch a bee out of the air if it got into our house and then carry it outside and release it. The farmboy callouses on my hand kept the bee from stinging me.
One day a wasp was in the house, and with out thinking, I “snatched it” and started walking towards the door.
YEEEE—OWWW!
It was like an electric shock combined with a deep peircing burn.
I vouch for the veracity of this, but there’s a problem, you need regular doses. Keeping bees is one way. Stings are of negligible pain to a practitioner. But I understand that some physicians are using the venom as therapy. I’m ignorant of the sensation involved.
My stiff arthritic neck was without pain for quite some time. Maybe it was the vigorous movement I mad rather than an effect of the venom.