Aren’t you expected to remove the sting asap?
Glass milk bottle just emptied of boiling water creating a vacuum and sucking the sting out.
I watched my mum perform this on my younger sister in the middle of nowhere on a sailing boat in the middle of the sea.
(I guess it couldn’t have been too far from land if she got stung by a bee).
Most bees have straight stingers, so no need to remove anything unless your attacker (defender?) is a honey bee.
Yes, you better remove the sting asap, because when bees sting, and fly away, they leave behind the sting with the venom sac…and the venom sac linen has muscles, which keep on pumping the venom rhythmically for at least 2 minutes! 
. … even if the bee has flown away (and will die, because of the organ damage). The stinger of worker bees seen under microscope appears as a saw with teeth, so, to remove the sing, you will have to pull with your nails, tweezers, or whatever you have at hand.
The only honey bee who does NOT have a sawed-stinger is the Queen bee!!! why? because she can sting several times, and not die!
2 Likes
Yes, but we should remember that most bees have a straight stinger…a couple of weeks ago, I was stung by one bee twice, then she flew away happy. Natives have straight stingers, honey bees have barbed stingers.
For all those who have never seen an attached tick:
Here’s one from yesterday after working in the garden. I even had a shower but was rushed as I needed to cook so didn’t see it.
I noticed it this morning (after another shower) and removed it with tick tweezers.
I did use insect repellant but not the one specifically for ticks.
2 Likes
Some amazing images with electron microscope of ticks and also a video of one burrowing into skin:
1 Like
I was quite impressed with my cheap Chinese smart phone’s camera!
I’ve just pulled one out of my inner thigh. Was intact and still wiggling but it had broken my skin. Have disinfected the site. I think I only picked it up this morning in the forest. Had long trousers, socks and boots on.
Yikes! yes! you can see its head burrowed in!
this little bstrds are learning how to crawl in, up and through various layers of clothing – either that, or there are thousands this year 
I also got one on my wrist after clearing the jungle around the beehives
There seem to be thousands of ticks this year.
OH and I have both had several tick bites this season despite pretty OTT precautions, and I take at least one tick off Robin Goodfellow every day. Some days many ticks. (And yes, he gets the monthly preventative.) In all my years here I’ve never seen so many ticks.
Quick question - I had one shot of the FSME vaxx six years ago, but I didn’t get the second and third doses because my then GP retired mid-course. Is there a test to determine if I have sufficient protection?
Yes, there is an antibody test that your (new) GP can make.
I had it several years ago myself to check immunity after 10 years of the last vaccine (well, I had it made in Czech, I don’t know how expensive might be here in Switzerland).
1 Like
One factor may have been the very warm April weather. Ticks like warm, so they can crawl up your legs!
1 Like
Or can you just take the 2nd and 3rd doses now?
1 Like
I think she would probably need to have all three doses given how much time has elapsed since the first one.
I would recommend she goes to her GP to ask, or asks at the pharmacy. Lots of pharmacies administer the tick borne encephalitis vaccine.
1 Like
I know it’s not particularly fashionable, but I always tuck my trousers into my socks. Ticks have to work a lot harder that way. Wearing lighter-colored clothes also helps one to spot ticks.
3 Likes
The ankles of my trousers have an adjustable popper fastener which I click around the boot but perhaps I should go for a full trouser cuff tuck into the socks.
On the other hand, I just found this online. You spray it on your clothes and it looks like it gives a first line of protection:
1 Like
dunno, I never had any tick despite the warnings all around, until one time when I had to do emergency core dump 
so naturally I went into nearby bushes and kept still position for some time instead of just waking through. I didn’t even thought about checking for ticks so I discovered them a day later, actually just one on my chest which raised the alarm… I got 14 in total, all bastards settled to my upper body parts, but luckily no infection
14 at the same time???
exactly, at least discovered at the same time
it was one of the difficult dumping cases, so I spend 5 to maybe 10 min in the hockende position, yup quite shocking how many of these little bastards managed to climb up on such occasion
Well, sorry for diverting the thread, but that’s just funny subject/memory. Let’s be honest, a normal dump is just few seconds to take your pants down, ~30 seconds to dump, then clean, dress up, wash hands, done. A couple of years ago we suddenly stared having “toilet shortage” problem at the office. There was 4 floors, 3 toilets on each. One of those days I went to a nearby toilet and waited, I guess I had been waiting about 5 min already when I just thought of starting stopwatch, it clocked 40 min until a young gen-Z guy came out of it with a smartphone in his hand. I was half-joking to my boss that we need now security guys at the door of each toilet to confiscate smartphones upon entrance 