Fire Ants Got Me.

[Hobo,NC]

Brought a tractor yesterday a junker when I went to pull the ramps out on the trailer the retainer pen was bent so got down on knees and beat it straight. I felt what I thought was a skeeter bite then another near my manhood buy that time they had my right leg covered. I may have felt 4 bites are so knocked them off and went back to beat'N on the pin while laying on the trailer. It was hot I was sweating and miserable.

About 2AM I woke up with chest pains I am not one to go to the ER but I did git in the car and drove to the ER. I went thur the normal checks for a heat condition got the nitro pills a patch and a IV... About the time they were done and wanted to keep me I remembered the fire ant bites they did not even look at them all they wanted was for me to spent a day and a night at the Hospital even tho every think looked great. I was still sore in the chest but not hurting the nitro pill killed the pain in a minuet are so.

I left at 5:30 does everyone drive to work at 5:30 the bypass was crowded... I just made a pot of coffee and went to work I had more to do today that the law allows. When I set down in the shop with my coffee my leg was starting to burn I looked and from my knee up to my hip it was red and blister from fire ant bites best I could count several hundred. I was glad I ware tight drawers briefs are what ever you call'em...

No doubt in my mind my issue was from the fire ant bites but to man up I am going to pay my dues to a heart doc Friday morning at 9....

 

[Stephen Newell]

Skeeter bite. What kind of fire ants do you have? The ones I have you would think you got into a yellow jacket nest.

 

[RedMF40]

Sounds like a miserable time, glad you're ok. Best wishes from Maryland.

 

[jacksun65]

Yes enough fire ant bites can kill you. Sounds like you have an allergic reaction to fire ants. I have found out when I got older I had problems I didn't think about. I
couldn't breathe one weekend went to the emergency room turns out I have asthma go figure 50 yrs no problem now I have it.

 

[4play]

If it really was a fire ant, its not their bite that gets you. They do bite but only to hold on while they sting you and inject venom. The stinger in on their rear end just like a bee or wasp.

I been swarmed by them before, once similar to the OP, while hooking up a trailer. I started feeling stinging/burning all over my leg up under my jeans. They don't hurt me bad but I had about 20 little stings and blisters after it was over.

 

[4play]

Fire ants are small ants, but they attack in swarms and quickly. Its rare to only get several or less stings unless you were real quick to notice them on you before they stung.

The ants around here I hate are those large red ants (harvester ants) They not only have a powerful bite, their sting and venom are potent too, much worse 1-on-1 compared to fire ants.

 

[da.bees]

Friend that manage's a golf course was approached by a lady saying the greens keeper was exposing himself near # hole. When he went to check on the man he was suffering fire ant stings between his ankles and waist. Poor feller was wearing a jumpsuit and had to get completely out of it in order to get to his legs.

 

[wjytexas]

I've been in the ER quite a few times from them. I actually went into anaphylactic shock a couple of time. I have carried an epipen fro many years. I haven't reacted for
several years now but don't take any chances, it only takes about 15 minutes to be unconscious.

 

[37chief]

That's one thing we don't have is fire ants. I have had a mouse or two go up my pant leg in the past, working in the hay. That's about all. Stan

 

[kcm.MN]

Those fire ants are really bad news. Another insect I never want to mess with is the wingless wasp, sometimes called "cow killer ant":
http://wildflowers.jdcc.edu/Cow_Ant.html

The females have no wings and can shove their stinger through (4) layers of denim!! The ones I saw in SE Texas were about 1" long. Fortunately, they seem to be solitary - never saw more than one at a time.

 

[ASEguy]

Sorry to hear that Hobo.

 

[ss55]

Hope you are feeling better today.

 

[Richard G.]

We have to fight them all the time here in NW SC. Fellow in Spartanburg died a few years ago after they got him.
Did not have them in the upstate till the EPA took Mirex off the market.
Experts said they would never get this far north.
Well, I predict they will be in the midwest before long.
Richard in NW SC

 

[grayrider]

Hate you got stung, I absolutely hate them with a passion. Here in south Alabama they are probably worse here than anywhere else, they sting children, adults, pets, etc. Their fire ant mounds ruin lawnmower blades, bush hog blades, shear the bush hog drive shaft bolts, they get in our homes when extremely dry or wet. And I've yet to find a poison that will kill them, the store bought poison just causes them to relocate their mounds a few feet away, but gasoline works on them......

 

[JML755]

Hobo,
wow, hope your visit on Friday turns up nothing. Living in Michigan we only hear stories about fire ants, I figured it would be like a "skeeter bite". Didn't know they could be that dangerous. Hate to say it, but keep them down south.

 

[Hobo,NC]

I have to keep a constant hunt going on for them after a rain 7 to 10 hills appear out of the ground. You learn were they like to live but they will fool you sometimes and get in a shandy place. The also like a concrete slab are a walkway. They will build and come thru a crack in concrete and make there way into a building.

Years back I ran thru a high mound in a field on my golf cart by accident. That night I parked the cart in the shop the next day when I moved the cart they had moved the dirt to the floor and made a mound on the concrete floor under the cart :SHOCK:

Its not the first time they have got me but the worst. If they get into your shoes you will come out of them. I had shorts on and a knee in the mound the mound was in a pile of leaves I did not notice it till it was too late. A bud remind me late yesterday they are what killed another buds mom.

 

[Two Dogs]

After a rain I like to go out among the newly made fluffy mounds and scrape off the top layer that brings them to the top. I then use my garden sprayer filled with my environmentally friendly mix of gasoline, diesel fuel, and used motor oil to kill the exposed ones and then stick the nozzle down the nest to get a few more. Sweet revenge. TDF

 

[mb58]

Here in Louisiana, back in the early 1970's, they sprayed (with granules) the whole country from the air with some old WW2 medium bombers. For almost a year, you couldn't find a fire ant. When time came for the second spraying, which would have been the end of fire ants as we know them, the tree-huggers took over and got it stopped. You know the rest. Fire ants won the war and today they control the country.

 

[fusion]

No Fire Ants here in Pennsylvania
but we have a Tick Problems
causing many Tick Borne Diseases

 

[jeffcat]

Here is what to do with your fire ants. Watch several videos on Utube
to see how it is done. Melt down a couple of old lawnmower engines
with a gas jet furnace. Then you can sell the castings for big bucks.
Go take a look on Ebay. Definitely wipes out the colony in seconds.
ant casting

 

[Tom in Ga]

They are bad to get in buried cable pedestals. We carried wasp spray to spray with and it worked pretty good. If I didn't have spray I would dig
in and stir them up and burn them with my torch, stir some more and burn more of them. Somebody asked if that would get them. I told them it got all the ones that mattered. Tommy

 

[JerryS]

I have a hot water faucet on the outside of my house. When I find a fire ant mound within reach of my hose I turn on the hot water and
burrow the hose nozzle into the mound, let it run for a few minutes. You can see how effective the treatment was the next day: the few
survivors have hauled all those little ant carcasses out of the ground and dumped them outside the mound. It'll make you smile.

 

[Mark - IN.]

The first time that I ever encountered them was when I was stationed at Ft. Gordon, GA. That's also where I caught my first rattle snake and my first cotton mouth. I didn't know that a rattle snake could dislocate it's snout and lower jaw until I had one around the throat at the back of the head and it dislocated both the upper and lower and the fangs were right at my fingers so I tossed it. Cotton mouth? That is just one mean snake. As far as fire ants go though, I first witnessed what they could do in the brush at Ft. Hood, TX when I heard some rustling around and walked over to see a copper head that made the mistake of crossing over a nest of them and they came out and went right to it. It was thrashing around and within a couple of minutes there was almost nothing left of it. They stripped it clean. Down there I had been bitten by a few. It was impossible not to. What surprised me is that they have fire ants in Germany too. I was stationed in Mannheim and we were out in the woods on maneuvers and we were taking a class on BIO/Chemical and dressed for it in chem suits. We were standing around and I was standing on a small hill that was mushy as I moved around. I got bit by something on my hands and looked down. My chem suit was coated with them. That little mushy hill was a nest. I ran a few steps, hit the ground rolling to get them off. Some of the other fellas came to my rescue and were scraping them off of me. I survived. I haven't seen any in Indiana so I assume they aren't that far north yet.

Go get yourself checked out just the same. Next Tuesday I am as well.

Mark

 

[Hobo,NC]

I am about to itch to death A guy told me Vinegar would cure the itch from fire ant stings/bites he's right I put some on about a hour ago and itch is gone . He showed me some pix of his foot just one sting he about lost his toe. He had a pix were he put vinegar on the bite as soon as it happen it was not good but 100% better than the first one. He totes a little bottle of vin in his pocket.

Just checked my bank account on-line I see a Combined insurance draft it reminded me HEY that's what I got accident insurance for now If I can get it documented I mentioned this in the ER I can get my $300 co-pay back...