Steve,
No, off course I would not wait a week to go to the doctor.
But not all Recluse bite reactions are that severe.
Thanks for the pictures. The pictures show how nasty things can get and spider bites are not to be taken lightly.
Photo 1 would have me worried. But I probably wouldn’t run down to the doctor if I had no idea about Brown Recluse spiders.
Photo 2 would have me sh*tting my pants and wondering what evil I could have committed to deserve this!
Photo 3 I will not eat anything for dinner today that is made with tomatoes.
Ralph
Holy crud!!!
I was bitten by a Brown Recluse two years ago.
While the Terminix people are sure I was not, and are worried I might try to sue them for inadequate pest control, I have two doctors and a PA who are convinced this is what happened… and there certainly ARE recluse spiders in North Carolina. We’ve caught two more since the incident…
In any case, the first clue was an intense itching and burning, with two puncture wounds just a couple of mm apart. The spider has two fangs that it uses to inject the venom. The wound swelled to the size of a silver dollar and turned purple over the next few days, and a fever and aches set in… the area around the wound was red and swollen. At that point I decided I needed a doctor’s help… and they confirmed what I’d thought and prescribed antibiotics, and surgical anti-microbe soap. Eventually it burst, and left a crater the size of half a golf ball in my chest, that took forever to heal (it was very like #2 above, just not so large.) The venom spread somewhat to where I had smaller eruptions across my chest, and up into my neck… and while the original healed, I still have raised scars the size of a nickel where it happens; it looks like I’ve been shot.
This is nothing I’d wish on anyone… but figured I’d chime in, as mine didn’t spread as badly as the ones in the photos above, and I heard all about misdiagnosis… sometimes it really is the spider.
All creatures with more than 4 legs are consequently shoot first and ask questions later in this house. Had a wolf spider drop on me the other day … and it met a violent end. Once bitten, and twice … well, if not arachnaphobic, at least decisive.
Matthew (OV)
Ray Dunakin said:yea....ditto..........
Holy crud!!!
Granted, that is probably a worst case scenario…
While in a year long Navy school preparing me to go to sea as the “Medicine Man” aboard a Navy combatant vessel with less than 400 crew, one of my classmates was bitten early on by a Brown Recluse. We have what amounted to a year long tutorial on Brown Recluse bites. It was very informative!
Thought this might be a handy thing in case someone needs to know what they look like because I didn’t…
I have a semi-finished basement that seems to play host to a bunch of different kinds of spiders. The unfinished ceiling they seem to love to drop down from (bare floor joists). I found a remedy for keeping them out of the basement entirely. I was buying all sorts of sprays, etc. spending lots of my railroad cash, when an elderly woman asked me if I had ever tried hedge apples. This piqued my curiosity.
After talking with her I went out and found about 20 hedgeapples on the ground in a park and took them home. I placed them up in the floor joists (I have 1x2 cross braces between the joist forming X’s. Withing 2 weeks the spiders were gone!
Every fall I change out the hedge apples and haven’t had a spider problem since. They last over the winter, spring and the following summer. (Remember, these are HEDGE apples, not HORSE apples. Wouldn’t want to mess with those in my basement ceilings!)
Mike
Mike, is your basement completely finished? seams to me unless you basement (garage/crawlspace/etc.) is not completely closed off to the exterior, you’ll continue to have bug problems as they are finding a rather easy way into the space.
My old Garage had more holes in it than a block of swiss cheese hit with a shotgun full of birdshot. I had a seamingly endless problem with cobspiders getting in and making a mess in the rafters and joists above. however the new garage, has enclosed eaves, sealed doors and a sheathing of plywood over the interior walls sealing them up, the incicent of spider incursions has been dramiticly lower, only near the entries, and they are handles with an occasional shot of Spider-Be-Gone followed with a broom cleaning
Mike Helphinstine said:I once heard about the same cure for cockroaches. An old timer in Texas used to swear by it. Ralph
I have a semi-finished basement that seems to play host to a bunch of different kinds of spiders. The unfinished ceiling they seem to love to drop down from (bare floor joists). I found a remedy for keeping them out of the basement entirely. I was buying all sorts of sprays, etc. spending lots of my railroad cash, when an elderly woman asked me if I had ever tried hedge apples. This piqued my curiosity. After talking with her I went out and found about 20 hedgeapples on the ground in a park and took them home. I placed them up in the floor joists (I have 1x2 cross braces between the joist forming X's. Withing 2 weeks the spiders were gone! Every fall I change out the hedge apples and haven't had a spider problem since. They last over the winter, spring and the following summer. (Remember, these are HEDGE apples, not HORSE apples. Wouldn't want to mess with those in my basement ceilings!) Mike
I’ve seen a few black widows here in central Virginia, but never a brown recluse. The black widows are eliminated, but the rest I leave alone (unless they are in the house). My problem is that living in the woods you have a constant battle against the spider webs. During May they are so abundant you have to carry a stick to walk around the layout. Very annoying, but still not as bad as the little black ants. They love to colonize the buildings in the village.