I went camping a week and a half ago
(devil's river, south texas) and when I
woke up the first morning, I had tons of
bites on my ankles, and a few on my hands
and legs. They did not itch and they were
perfect circles, about a centimeter in
diameter. They looked a little like
chigger bites. The next morning, the red
bumps faded in color and size and the next
day they seemed almost gone. Now, they
look and feel a little like fire ant bites
and itch like crazy.
Does anyone have any ideas what this could
be? It's driving me nuts b/c I used
insect repellant and wore long sleeves and
pants. No one else with me really had any
bites.
Thanks for your help....Any thoughts are
appreciated.
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Phatsoa
New User, Becoming EHEALTHy
Joined: 19 Mar 2008 Posts: 1
sandflys Posted: 03-19-08 03:54am
Hi Brooke. It is a pretty old letter, but
I think the bites were sandflys. Not the
gnat or noseeums type, but like the
Australian one. My husband and I were
told to look out for sandflys on the
beaches in WA, but we did not see any
flies, only a tiny tiny minute light
brownish thing, we could only see because
there were clouds of them.
In the evening we were covered in perfect
circles, very red and about 1 cm in
diameter. We were not worried as they did
not itch....untill next day and the next 3
weeks. WE had more than 400 of these
things which now looked like giant
mosquito bites and itched 10 times more.
We had to take antihistamines not to go
crazy. Locals told us it was a sandfly
and that it was not a bite but urine...I
don't know if this is true. The upside is
that they said to mix dettol and baby oil
and rub it on your skin. This would
prevent the bites or whatever it was. It
did and was not as bad as the insect
repellants you can buy.
Phatsoa
