Do you live in chigger country?

Maura · #21 07/17/13, 04:15 PM

Many people use Vitamin B1, but they start taking it two weeks in advance of going into bug country. You need that long for the skin to smell different.

Chickens and guineas are your best control.

farmrbrown · #22 07/17/13, 04:48 PM

+1 on sulfur dust and shower immediately when you come back inside.

backwoods · #23 07/17/13, 04:55 PM

I am a chigger magnet, and also have an allergic type reaction to them. When I get them, they last for a month or longer. The best thing I've found to treat the bites is camphophenique or straight ammonia. With the ammonia, just dab a drop on it. Yes, they both stink, but when you itch with them like I do you'll cut a hole in yourself to make it stop!!! Their are many misconceptions about them, they do not burrow into your skin. Do a search on them. Keeping the grass clipped short helps tremendously, as do guineas. I 2nd the suggestion of spraying your clothes really well with Deep Woods Off. I jokingly refer to it as my "Summer perfume." When you come inside you must wash immediately, and also wash the clothes you were wearing or they can live inside those clothes for a couple days and attack you some more if you wear them again without doing so. Even taking a slightly soapy wash cloth and wiping yourself down will kill & remove them from your body. I feel for you! Once your place is cleaned up and kept mowed they shouldn't be as much of a problem. Guineas do an excellent job of controlling them. As for the other black face bugger's, can't help ya, sorry. But Deep Woods Off should help with them as well, I even spray a ball cap & wear it just to deter gnats, mosquitoes, ticks, etc. I have given up berry picking

Mountainman62 · #24 07/17/13, 05:05 PM

Chiggers (or redbugs) are just a fact of life in the South along with fireants and kudzu. Spray with OFF all over. Best thing you can do. The little flying bugs might be noseeums. They are a little midge that are a nuisance. All a part of the great outdoors!

oneokie · #25 07/17/13, 05:11 PM

Avon Skin so Soft is a good bug repellant.

Bathing in a bleach solution will help some. Calamine Lotion and Benadryl helps with the itching.

Let your fingernails grow long so you can cultivate them. You haven't had a bad case of chigger bites until you legs from your hips to the soles of your feet look like freshly ground hamburger. BTDT, got several T-shirts.

ETA: If you can find them, Sulfur Cream of Tartar tablets will help. Ate a ton of them as a kid.

dizzy · #26 07/17/13, 05:54 PM

Just a word of caution-if you're allergic to sulfa drugs, DO NOT put sulfur on your skin! It will cause an allergic reaction!

RebelDigger · #27 07/17/13, 06:08 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by oneokie

Avon Skin so Soft is a good bug repellant.

Bathing in a bleach solution will help some. Calamine Lotion and Benadryl helps with the itching.

Let your fingernails grow long so you can cultivate them. You haven't had a bad case of chigger bites until you legs from your hips to the soles of your feet look like freshly ground hamburger. BTDT, got several T-shirts.

ETA: If you can find them, Sulfur Cream of Tartar tablets will help. Ate a ton of them as a kid.

Skin so Soft, great stuff. I use the bath oil to take a bath then this year bought the moist towelletts to wipe on before going out. Two lines of defense! This is the first year I have been able to pick blackberries without getting eaten alive by chiggers and mosquitoes. For the bites you already have, moisten a cotton ball with bleach and dab it on the bites, it kills them. Chiggers burrow into the skin and are still alive in there which is what causes the itching, the bleach kills them.

As a child, about a month before I left for summer camp my Mom started dosing me with the Sulfer tablets. I never got ticks or chiggers but did still get mosquito bites.

Txrider · #28 07/17/13, 07:46 PM

Got chiggers here, well not so bad at my place but awful at my folks house. Best thing I have found after 53 years here is keep things mowed around the house and either use the sulfur sock to dust from the knees down, including socks, or spray from the knees down with off.

Chiggers climb up to the top of the grass and wait for something warm blooded to come by and brush the plant and they hop off and bite, get enough blood and then jump off and go try to mate and lay eggs.

Putting a repellent on where the grass is going to brush on you keeps em off. Shorts and sandals are as good as pants and shoes, which won't stop em anyway. They like to bite damp soft skin, with no shoes and long pants your feet/ankles and legs aren't as sweaty and soft and they don't bite as much.

lonelyfarmgirl · #29 07/18/13, 07:41 AM

Thanks for the suggestions guys, Chiggers do not burrow into the skin. We looked it up. They inject some kind of poison to make your flesh useable to their bodies and it makes the skin form a hard tube which is the itchy mountain that grows, then they drop off. Must be some potent poison to itch that bad.

The place isn't well mowed, as we aren't living there yet, but it really wasn't bad. The only super tall grass I was in was around the berry bushes. Husband really wasn't in any all all as he was only cutting hay.

I wonder it a garlic based home made spray would have the same effect as eating lots of garlic? If we showered after touching long grass, we'd be showering 10 times a day!

Alas, to the guinea suggestion. We got rid of ours this spring as we were tired of them crapping on everything. We've had them for years. Having them gone is a relief!

Taylor R. · #30 07/18/13, 09:33 AM

It only takes a bit of contact! If there's grass over your shoes, they climb right aboard. It's amazing how quick they can hop on and take a bite. I know my essential oil mix that I use as a bug deterrent doesn't deter the chiggers at all, but I don't use any garlic in it.

Maybe you could try it and report back to us??

lonelyfarmgirl · #31 07/18/13, 11:31 AM

I'm doing some research about how to make something like that. The neighboor also said he puts vanilla extract (imitation) on his bald head and it helps keep the little black bugs from touching him. we will be trying that next time we go over there as well.

debd0712 · #32 07/18/13, 09:39 PM

I have found that Guineas do a wonderful job of controlling chiggers, and no longer get bites on my property. However, once you have been bitten Absorbine (horse liniment) or Absorbine Jr really works for me to control the insane itching. Only thing I have found that does work on me. I carry a bottle of Absorbine Jr in my purse to reapply when needed. Good luck, and hope you find something that works well for you.

danarutan · #33 07/18/13, 09:59 PM

Try using sevin dust to get rid of chiggers, and a cream called Appalachian Secrets works well to heal up bites you have.

brosil · #34 07/19/13, 08:13 AM

Absorbine Jr. works for me on the bites. I'll be trying the sulfur dust today. I hope it works. Bug repellent didn't work.

lonelyfarmgirl · #35 07/19/13, 10:17 AM

Exactly what do you do with the sevin dust? It's many many many acres of property, and sevin dust is a terrible poison.

Will I be destined to never be able to enjoy gardening again? Where we live now, we have tall weeds in alot of places. I pull them for my sheep everyday. I feel such dread at moving with this realization of chiggars, face touching bugs and ticks.

Anyone want to buy a beautiful 80 acre farm?

HillbillyBowyer · #36 07/19/13, 10:21 PM

I live in the south where ticks & chiggers are common & I spend a lot of time in the woods & fields all year long.

I drink a tablespoon full of apple cider vinegar every evening. Haven't had a chigger or tick in many years.

My wife makes oil & vinegar salad dressing & its a little easier than drinking it straight.

CajunSunshine · #37 07/20/13, 01:17 AM

Until I moved to an area full of coyotes and such, my free ranging chickens worked well for controlling the ticks...fire ants took care of the chiggers.

Best pain relief I've ever used for tick and chigger bites, fire ant and bee stings is top quality Tea Tree Oil (Desert Essence is my favorite brand for ultimate potency). Tip: apply a dab to the bitten/stung area, wait a minute, apply a second dab. This way, I enjoy hours of relief. Nothing else works for me for reliving the maddening chigger bites.

Danaus29 · #38 07/20/13, 04:46 PM

The worst case of chigger bites I ever got was from setting on a lawn at an outdoor concert.

Just discovered this summer that a liberal application of witch hazel keeps the itch down and helps the bumps heal faster.

This years crop of chigger bites came from setting on my mowed lawn.

lonelyfarmgirl · #39 07/20/13, 07:53 PM

Danaus thats very interesting about the mowed lawns. I do have to admit, I am not good at keeping the yard well mowed. Who has time for that nonsense?

Nature_Lover · #40 07/21/13, 09:49 AM

Chiggers take up to four hours to inject enough venom to make their sippy tube through your skin.

They have a very soft body, the first time you scratch a chigger, they are dead and gone. All that's left is that bite site.

I always wipe off with a dry bandanna when I've been tromping around. I carry it with me, and stop to wipe everywhere I have tight clothes, I also wipe off my bare legs.
I'm in my 50s, but I go commando in the woods, underwear is overrated in chigger country.
I wipe off about every three or four hours. Sometimes I'll get a chigger bite where I missed wiping off, but I guess I caught it the next time I rubbed them off, because instead of a week-long itch, it's usually gone the next day. They aren't on me long enough to do any damage.

This works for me.
It worked for my girl scouts, the ones who didn't wipe off were the only ones who got chigger bites, and they started doing it, too.