"Frogwatch" wrote in message
...
On Oct 18, 8:05 pm, Frogwatch wrote:
On Oct 18, 7:52 pm, Vic Smith wrote:



On Sun, 18 Oct 2009 19:12:09 -0400, wrote:
On Sun, 18 Oct 2009 18:59:06 -0400, Wayne.B
wrote:

On Sun, 18 Oct 2009 15:08:51 -0700 (PDT), Frogwatch
wrote:

On Oct 18, 5:28 pm, thunder wrote:
On Sun, 18 Oct 2009 14:04:32 -0700, Frogwatch wrote:
Had my daughter at her crew practice so I took a walk an the
nature
trail. By the time I got outta the woods my legs were itching and
by
Thur night I had obvious bites all over. Now, I am covered with
itchy
welts. YIKES, redbugs. I used to be immune to them what's going
on
here. I'd only get a few but this is major. Now I see why people
hated
them so much. Oddly, my entire family was immune to them but now
I am
not.

What are red bugs? Chiggers?

Chiggers, yup

Try rubbing the bites with ammonia. It's amazingly effective on
mosquito bites.

A paste of baking soda on fire ants, wasps and other acid based venom
critters. The ones that eat you inject some kind of saliva but I am
not sure about the pH of that.

I got ate up down there about a month ago.
Not sure what it was - maybe a combo of no-see-ums and some kind of
little black fly that swarmed me as soon as we entered a nature
preserve in Punta Gorda.
Some nature preserve. Just a place where they put a trail through the
woods, and never spray. Not fit for human beings. Probably the only
thing in there is bugs and the bugs that eat other bugs.
Didn't get a good look as I didn't have my glasses on.
Started to swat them off, but there were too many - so we ran like
hell out of there. Still see the spots on my legs.
Good reason to never wear shorts in the woods.
I tried the ammonia stuff Wayne suggested, among a few other things,
but nothing helped to reduce the itching except time.
Managed to resist scratching through sheer will power, but them things
poisoned me good. All that resisting makes you prone to drinking beer
to make you forget about the itching.
So there is an upside.
Probably lost my resistance to bug bites. Haven't been hit like that
since I was a kid. Hardly got my wife at all, and usually it's the
reverse.

--Vic

When I as in college, one afternoon prob after smoking enough to have
really poor judgement, 4 of us decided to go for a nice romantic
campout on the coast in the dunes. We talked a friend into driving us
down to Bald Point south of Tallahassee in the middle of nowhere and
drop us off to pick us up the next day.
Afternoon was ok but then the no-see-ums came out around dusk. We had
no tent cuz we didnt expect rain and no sleeping bags cuz i was still
summer and we was mizerable. No breeze at all. The only way to get
relief was to stand in the middle of the paved road with 10 feet on
either side to the sand. The density of no-see-ums was just a trifle
lower in the middle of the road. To sleep, we would lay down in the
road while somebody was appointed to look out for cars. No cars came
the entire night. Funny now but wasnt then.

I just read that indians used wax myrtle as a natural repellent.
Dunno how well it'd work but it does grow everywhere here. Also read
that willow bark has natural aspirin, willow is everywhere near water
too.
_______
How did they use the wax myrtle?