Gardening Time Means Bugs

I love to garden so this is truly my favorite time of year. I really hate it when I go to get my gardening implements and tools are missing. I have been spending my weekends preparing my garden, even enlarging it by quite a bit, to get my veggies in. Yesterday I was going to work the garden before it got too hot and then mow the lawn, which grows as I watch it sometimes (I’d still rather the grass than snow). I ended up having to wait on a telephone call that was to be before noon but didn’t come in until three. Bummer. It was supposed to rain by Saturday night and not stop for a few days. My day was shot. I got my seeds and seed potatoes, tiller and then looked for the hoe that was supposed to be hanging on the wall of our shed next to a garden rake that is the same size. No hoe. After an exhaustive search I gave up. I lost even more time and ended up using the rake to plant. That is not easy either. I got roughly a third of the garden done.

I noticed around five o’clock gnats started swarming and by five thirty I was so overtaken by them I had to quit. I kid you not, I have welts all over my neck, face, ears, even one on one of my vertebrae on the back of my neck. They are swollen like bee stings, itch and feel bruised to the touch. The one on the back of my neck actually created a huge lump that distorted the shape of my neck and the other ones on my neck and face are so concentrated that they have affected the lymph nodes causing painful swelling all the way to my ears.  I’ve gone through about a half tube of the highest percentage hydrocortisone cream I can get and still ended up taking Benadryl last night, which only succeeded in helping me sleep; not stopping the itch.

This morning I made a drawing salve I have generally used for infected mosquito bites (it really works too). It helped the itch within minutes. They are still really red and swollen and painful though. I don’t know what to do with that. Maybe some hydrocortisone with lidocaine or aloe with lidocaine will help with the pain. I’ll have to try that next. See in the picture some of the bites. Just so you know – it’s really hard to take pictures of bites like these by oneself. Trust me; they’re huge.

                                                      Welts from bites of gnats on my neck. 

Recipe for Salve:

In a small cup (I use a 3-oz. bathroom cup) combine 1 tablespoon non-iodized salt and 1 tablespoon petroleum jelly. Mix well with something like a tongue depressor. Place a hot washcloth on affected area (to help bring venom or yucky infected stuff closer to the surface) for about a minute. Spread salve on the wound/bites fairly thick. Do not cover. As the petroleum jelly soaks into the skin the salt will start to fall off, so you will have to clean it off within about a half hour. You will see the salt change colors where the wound is. Infected wounds will turn yellow!

Clean area with a warm damp cloth. If treating an infected bite, apply an antibiotic ointment and cover with a bandage. If it is just an itchy bite, don’t cover it. Re-apply if the itching starts up again. Mine has lasted several hours so far keeping the itch at bay. The one on the back of my neck looked like a huge lump and has gone down to normal.