first sting of the year

[Bisamratte]

I've just been stung by a wasp :aargh4:

My girlfriend has a good cure though......Beer and onions

You hold a cut onion on the sting and after much pain the swelling reduces significantly, then drink some beer to help take your mind off the pain

We seem to be having problems with wasps this year: they are much more aggressive and their sting is more powerful. I've heard stories about peoples arms or legs swelling up so much that they cant walk or write

Horse flies are also doing similar damage to people, maybe its all the pesticides/insecticides making them stronger

Are their similar problems in the uk?

Andy

 

[Ed]

then drink some beer to help take your mind off the pain

I'll have to add it to my medicine box

Ed

 

[Brocktor]

i have not seen many wasps this summer - why is this?

 

[Draven]

I'll have to add it to my medicine box

You mean... it's not there already?

My girlfriend has a good cure though......Beer and onions

You hold a cut onion on the sting and after much pain the swelling reduces significantly, then drink some beer to help take your mind off the pain

Is the juice from onions alkali by any chance? I've heard that wasp stings are acidic, so something alkali helps, and that bee stings are alkali so something acidic helps. I know that vinegar helps when I get stung by a bee... maybe the ideal cure is to be stung by both at the same time!

Are their similar problems in the uk?

Don't reckon so, mate. I've seen a few bees, maybe a couple wasps. Not as many as there were a few years ago though. Probably all this weather-changing nonsense, knocking them out of sync...

It wouldn't surprise me if insect repellants/pesticides do make them stronger. Dunno about making their stings/bites stronger, but they'll be getting resistant, most creatures do. Rats, for example, adapt very quickly to poisons... same with people, chew hot pepper seeds all your life and you won't choke every time well... maybe...

 

[pteron]

Be careful out there, the Beeb were reporting two deaths from wasp stings this summer.

 

[Bisamratte]

Is the juice from onions alkali by any chance? I've heard that wasp stings are acidic, so something alkali helps, and that bee stings are alkali so something acidic helps. I know that vinegar helps when I get stung by a bee... maybe the ideal cure is to be stung by both at the same time!

Im not sure why it works,and I havnt tried it with a bee sting. The onion thing seems to be common knowlage here and I hadnt heard of it before today. It will be some sort of chemical reaction but I thought onions are acidic. There must be someone here who knows about these things.

Don't reckon so, mate. I've seen a few bees, maybe a couple wasps. Not as many as there were a few years ago though. Probably all this weather-changing nonsense, knocking them out of sync...

I've seen loads of bees and wasps here, we had a very long cold winter followed by a very sudden and long hot spell. The weather now is more spring like than summer

Andy

 

[spoony]

got stung on the hand on thursday, little bugger stuck it right in took a couple of shakes to get him off, quite painful

 

[Trevody]

Definately more wasps and bees round our way this summer:
1 wasp nest in the garden hedge
1 nest of red bottomed bees in the garage
1 sand hornet spotted in the garden (made me jump a mile, big B*****d)
1 wasps nest on my allotment plot the size of a foot ball, until the council came and poisoned it
Masonary bees in the house wall

Trev

 

[JonathanD]

I swallowed one on Monday after it had crawled into my Coke can, bloody horrible feeling, it was buzzing in my throat. I must have drunk three pints of Guinness in the space of 5 seconds to try and flush it into my stomach and drown it before it decided to sting. Pure panic followed by intoxication.... great fun.

 

[Bisamratte]

I swallowed one on Monday after it had crawled into my Coke can, bloody horrible feeling, it was buzzing in my throat. I must have drunk three pints of Guinness in the space of 5 seconds to try and flush it into my stomach and drown it before it decided to sting. Pure panic followed by intoxication.... great fun.

That sounds nasty......

but its quite possably the best excuse for drinking three pints of Guinness in 5 seconds that I've ever heard

 

[al21]

I've had so many wasps around here this year, so many they've overwhelmed my bee hive at home. The bee were unable to defend themselves against the onslaught even though I'd reduced the entrance to allow only a single bee to pass. Really annoying as it was a very strong colony.

On the treatment for stings, I'd not heard of the Onion one before, but have always used vinegar for wasps and bicarb of soda for bees.

Al

 

[rik_uk3]

Less bees, more wasps here in South Wales this year, and more rats, my cats bought two dead ones home, first time in about 5 years. I've a stream at the back of the house, rats seem to come and go in cycles, you won't see them for years, then the cat comes home and drops one on the carpet

 

[spamel]

I found a wasp in my frosties the other day, must have crawled in the box for something sweet to eat! He seemed happy when I let him out, until I whacked him with a slipper! We get a few in the house each day at the moment, I think there is a nest somewhere around here.

I also saw a nest opposite Bergen Belsen (my stomping ground!) but it was in the ground. I didn't know that wasps dug in to the ground, there were all of these round honey comb sections on the ground around the nest. Needless to say, I legged it!!

 

[leon-b]

a few years ago our school had a wasps nest in one of the lights ( you know the strip lights with the big plastic covers ) there was loads of them in there
leon

 

[Bigman]

So far this year have been stung by a hornet in Spain, bitten by a horsefly and stung by a wasp in my back garden, pesky things, it's lucky that I'm not allergic to stings.

 

[bushtuckerman]

Beer stopped seamen getting scurvy apparently...all hail!

 

[hanzo]

Sorry to here about your wasp sting. I know they can be painful.

When my daughter was about 1 1/2, she was playing on a play structure at a park. Unbeknownst to everyone, there was a wasp nest inside the hollow structure. So while she was playing, they attacked her and she got about 4-5 stings before my wife was able to get to her. Those wasps were pretty evil, they concentrated all their stings in one part of her leg. I don't know if that is a normal thing or not.

We gave her some (very little) anti-histamine and washed the stings with vinegar. Fortunately, no major effect. But I was worried about a reaction for a day or two. So moral of the story is keep some anti-histamine in your kit as well as a little vinegar and/or meat tenderizer.

I just bought Mitigator® Sting and Bite Treatment Scrub to add to my kit. I have never used it. Anybody knows how well it works?

 

[Keith_Beef]

A couple of years ago I was at an outdoor "morning after" wedding reception (for the more distant friends of friends who didn't get invited to the proper bash).

So, standing around in a bit of shade under the ash and rowan trees, drinking champagne then red wine, waiting for the BBQ to get hot.

I felt something fall onto my head. Thinking it was a leaf, an ash key or a berry, I tried to brush it away with my hand.

It was a wasp. And it stung me on the finger.

Now, a guy over by the BBQ reckoned that heat would destroy the poison, and handed me a cigarette.

The trick, so I was told, is to hold the hot end near to the sting. Take a drag now and again to keep it good and hot.

Since I get stung about once every fifteen years, I can't really compare this cure to the slice of onion (not tried, but recommended by a Dutch friend) or the vinegar (recommended by the school nurse when I was 11 or 12).

K.