Hey guys,

I have had an unusually bad experience with stingers in Perth this week. Was in the water in 3 locations (Kiteboarding at Pinaroo pt. and swimming in City Beach and 'North Coogee' beach near Freo) and have been stung on each occassion. I react pretty badly to the stings, as in swelling and a pretty intense itch. Naturally I have turned into a bitter old sod now and think the ocean is out to get me :P
Seriously though, is anybody else getting stung as often as this? Also does anyone have any advice on avoiding the stingers (no smart ass comments about staying out of the water or staying on my board please

Where a steamer wetsuit


or


A teaspoon of cement in your morning coffee

u arent talkin about teh same stingers in cairns are u?
or is it similiar jellyfish to the blue bottle?

hate to see this bloke in darwin, cairns if he got stung it would be the end of the world and yes ive be stung by blue bottle and box would take the bluebottle anyday

if really concerned mate wear a stinger suit if the water aint to cold 4 ya

hot water. wash yourself with as hot as bearable water. drink a cup of concrete while ya at it.

but yer its like that this time of yr as i recall from previous seasons at pinnaz

Pinnaroo is pretty bad on a westerly wind all along the beach, but on a normally S'wester its the corner before mullaloo that gets the worst, so if you are a beginner and end up down the beach (prior to the good old walk of shame) you get a good dose of them. Or if you're an intermediate and the wind drops you end in the the same place. Try and stay upwind of the point if you can (intermediate) or come in before you go too far north (beginner).
cheers

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karrot goose said...

hate to see this bloke in darwin, cairns if he got stung it would be the end of the world and yes ive be stung by blue bottle and box would take the bluebottle anyday

if really concerned mate wear a stinger suit if the water aint to cold 4 ya

Always continue to be amazed by some of the hard ass BS that comes out in online forums. Mate, everyone reacts in different ways, and to varying degrees when stung by blue bottles, and I for one get a bad dose. Good on ya if you don't. Expected something like this so congrats on being predictable. And as for the cold, i'm happy to surf in Ireland during the winter season so I think I'll manage. Thanks again for the positive contribution!

my post is serious by the way hot water breaks down the venom. it was in a thread a lil while back

yeah go with the hot water you get loads of them when pulling pots they sting, but some people have really bad reactions.

patmchale,

I hear you. I'm the exact same. While my friends will get a sting and then never think about it again, I welt up and have very intense itching for about a week later. If you're like me, the sting itself is never that bad, but the welts and itching are the most miserable part of the whole experience. I've tried every trick and ointment in the book and absolutely nothing stops the itching except for ice.

And I'm a stinger magnetic. I get stung often in the summer, but I actually think that because I'm so sensitive it probably takes less for me to react than for others, which makes me more likely to get a sting.

Unfortunately, I don't have many tricks up my sleeve for avoiding them. When my triathlon training group does ocean swims, people will put body glide or Vaseline on the exposed skin. It supposedly makes the jellies slide off the skin instead of stick to you and sting you. The only other option is to wear a stinger suit. I'm pretty sure one of the guys at SOS told me once that O'Neil make one.

Good luck to you - I feel your pain!!

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patmchale said...

...(no smart ass comments about staying out of the water or staying on my board please)

Mate this is the only fun we have here, why you taking it away from us?
This is not the SBS round table show, this is Seabreeze. Even if you lose your head in an accident people here would tell you HTFU.

So my advice is HTFU.

I too get a pretty bad reaction from blueys.. if i get stung it goes straight to my glands causing faintness and serious cramps.. i have put this pic up before.. But this is from having a few dried up blueys stuck in my lines.. rolling my lines then rubbing my fat gut.. i have only been stung about 8 million times you would think i was immune to them by now

unfortunately with stingers like blue bottles, the more you get stung the worse it gets, you don't build up a tolerance, quite the opposite they get worse.

I've come off my board into a heap of the buggers and had to bodydrag back to my board a couple of years ago

I ended up getting stung by about 5-6 or the bastards with one sliding up my arm and sticking to the side of my neck (as it was out in front when I was bodydragging). It look like someone had taken to me with a cat-o-nine tails for about a week and itched like a bitch.

D

I heard urine stops the sting.
Its all good if you have been stung on the foot but its really hard if you have been stung on your back to piss over your shoulder

You might get some strange looks if you walk up to a stranger on the beach and say "can you please piss on my back"

I have been stung heaps of times and it has always been very painful. However on one occasion I suffered a pretty severe reaction.

The tentacles draped themselves neatly between my big toe and the next all the way up to my ankle. Whilst sitting on the beach waiting for the pain to subside I developed an agonising ache and swelling behind my knee and in my groin. It did not last for that long but it was a bit of a worry as I could not walk.

I have been stung heaps of times since and apart from the pain and itching it has subsided fairly quickly. I reckon I just got stung really badly on that occasion and it makes me wonder how bad it could be if you had a really good chain of tentacles draped around your throat. I reckon it could quite easily prove fatal.

It doesn't stop me from going in the water and I never lose the satisfaction of the pop when you tread on the nasty little ****ers!

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patmchale said...

karrot goose said...

hate to see this bloke in darwin, cairns if he got stung it would be the end of the world and yes ive be stung by blue bottle and box would take the bluebottle anyday

if really concerned mate wear a stinger suit if the water aint to cold 4 ya

Always continue to be amazed by some of the hard ass BS that comes out in online forums. Mate, everyone reacts in different ways, and to varying degrees when stung by blue bottles, and I for one get a bad dose. Good on ya if you don't. Expected something like this so congrats on being predictable. And as for the cold, i'm happy to surf in Ireland during the winter season so I think I'll manage. Thanks again for the positive contribution!

mate i did contribute wear a stinger suit pretty positive answer i should imagine (btw im with buzz on this one)

You can also get a snazzy red and blue version




www.spandex4men.com/SportsEN/SuitsEN.html

Think it should be spandex4'men'

Oh, and don't forget to 'pad'!

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Charl dv said...

hot water. wash yourself with as hot as bearable water. drink a cup of concrete while ya at it.

but yer its like that this time of yr as i recall from previous seasons at pinnaz

Far out, I was down at pinaroo this arvo , but choppy as, and I kicked something going in, felt like a sting and I thought it was a stringer and went "oh well it's only my toe and will stop burning in by the time I head back in............ when I got back to the beach about an hour later I saw a bit of blood....anyway by the time I got home my toe was puffy and the pain is intense about an 8 and the only thing that will stop the pain is hot water........WTF.....??????" like flicking a switch..........

Perhaps a sea urchin.........?????

Feel for ya mate - a week b4 my wedding in Jan '91, I was staying on my mate "Big Bill's" yacht at Rotto. We dived over the side to meet my some friends on the beach and BB swam straight into a stinger... Across both eyes... Eyes open... It blinded him for about 6 hours. We were a long way from the settlement and didn't have a tender with us. We flagged down a tinnie to take him to the nursing post. There was an upside for him though... I had to vacate the vessel for him later that evening so he could shag the nurse... Oh; and she drove him home in the ambulance...

I got tagged on the ankle by an Iru Kanji when I lived in Broome. Spent 4 hours in emergency, but I wasn't as bad as the 8yo indigenous girl who had a box jelly wrap around her leg at One Arm Point the same day. She was driven 200k's down one of the roughest dirt roads in Australia in an old commodore to get to Broome hospital. Did i mention I was there for 4 hours? Yeh, well while I was there, they had her leg wrapped in ice (on and off), and they gave her a morphone shot every 20 minutes... Poor kid.

Feel for ya mate, really do, but HTFU and rub some sand on it....

Cheers for all the feedback guys. That belly shot above looks nasty. Some good stories back. Well I guess the stingers are nothing to box jelly fish so i will HTFU a bit Still though am definately going to do as much as I can to avoid the 'feicers' (an Irish version of the expletive) Love the spiderman one Fooosh. Good stories Dunk. Happy Kiting guys!

vinegar is used for box jelly stings (stops the release of venom), not sure if it works with other stingers but might be worth a shot..

Found these:


news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/889969.stm


and..


Sea wasps (box jellyfish) are usually found in shallow waters, and swimming and other water activities are not recommended if you can see sea wasps in the sea. A normal wetsuit is usually not safe enough and it is therefore best to use a specially designed box jellyfish safe wetsuit to prevent being stung. There is however a poor mans trick for those without a suitable suit - sea wasps can't sting you trough nylon pantyhose's and this is why you can see Australian lifeguards wearing with nylon stockings over their arms and legs. Don't forget that a sea wasp can sting your head and neck if you don't protect these areas as well.

and...

http://www.isnorkel.com/product-exec/product_id/3941

also



www.godivaskincare.com/store/product.php?productid=117&cat=0&page=1

^^^ A specially designed stinger suit is a 1mil lycra wetsuit, so a normal wetsuit would be way more effective as long as it has close fitting neck and sleeves, which most wetsuits do. So you would be fine wearing a normal wet suit. Except that it's usually 30+ degrees where you need to use it...

wow i had not heard of safe sea before, what a product, has anyone here used it before?

found this:
How does Safe Sea® stop the sting?

Too slippery: Safe Sea® has a waterproof, slippery texture that makes it difficult for the stinging tentacles to attach to the skin.

Taking a tip from our friend the Clown Fish: Safe Sea® absorbs secretions from the skin that would otherwise tell the jellyfish that it's in contact with prey or predator.

Disrupt communication: Chemical stoppers in Safe Sea® block the chemical pathways where the stinging process is activated.

Disarm: A stinging cell is a dense "capsule" containing a long folded needle. Pressure builds in this capsule just prior to stinging. As the pressure builds, the capsule is forced open and the needle shoots out like a harpoon, injecting its target with toxin at a force equivalent to a bullet being fired from a gun. This all happens in a fraction of a second; jellyfish stings are among the most rapid mechanical events in all of cellular biology. Safe Sea® reduces the pressure in stinging cells so that they cannot fire - effectively disarming them.

Why is it important to have so many stoppers? Over 2000 stings will penetrate one square millimeter (or a million per square inch) of human skin during contact with a stinging tentacle. Each inhibitor in Safe Sea® does its part to reduce the total number of stinging cell penetrations to a level where there is no noticeable pain or inflammation.

Safe Sea® lotion has been clinically tested and proven to interfere with
this process and prevent a sting from occurring.

Safe Sea® lotion was clinically tested in multiple FDA-approved hospitals under the supervision of expert dermatologists.

During testing, jellyfish were brought in contact with the bare skin of volunteers. Each volunteer touched a jellyfish with Safe Sea®-protected skin and with unprotected skin, which served as a control for the intensity of the stinging.

In all of the volunteers tested, the skin protected by Safe Sea® was almost always free of any noticeable pain or irritation, while the unprotected skin developed pain, irritation, and inflammatory rash.

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Addikt said...

Far out, I was down at pinaroo this arvo , but choppy as, and I kicked something going in, felt like a sting and I thought it was a stringer and went "oh well it's only my toe and will stop burning in by the time I head back in............ when I got back to the beach about an hour later I saw a bit of blood....anyway by the time I got home my toe was puffy and the pain is intense about an 8 and the only thing that will stop the pain is hot water........WTF.....??????" like flicking a switch..........

Perhaps a sea urchin.........?????

That sounds like a cobbler, friend of mine got nailed by one. Cobblers hang around in the weed, can be in the shallows right on the shoreline in places where there's not much swell getting in. Extremely painful, but hot water eases pain dramatically. My mate surfed for 3 hours after being stung and only realised he had an issue when he got home. From that point he was entirely incapacitated. Maybe he should've kept surfing? Anyway, took 3 or 4 hours of moaning and hot water top ups before the pain eased. Need to be careful you don't burn yourself with the water, apparently quite easy to do when you're looking for relief.

I shuffle my feet along the bottom going through any weed. No idea if that really makes any difference but it's good to feel I'm proactively managing the situation. Whimpering is comforting too, in a flash gordon poking his hand in the tree stump kind of way.

www.seabreeze.com.au/Forums/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=44805
biomedicalsciences.unimelb.edu.au/departments/pharmacology/engage/avru

I have not tried Safe Sea, but I know that people use it in the States.

I'm going to buy some and give it a go... stuff is cheap and worth a go I reckon. I'll report what I find...

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gumby esq said...

Addikt said...

Far out, I was down at pinaroo this arvo , but choppy as, and I kicked something going in, felt like a sting and I thought it was a stringer and went "oh well it's only my toe and will stop burning in by the time I head back in............ when I got back to the beach about an hour later I saw a bit of blood....anyway by the time I got home my toe was puffy and the pain is intense about an 8 and the only thing that will stop the pain is hot water........WTF.....??????" like flicking a switch..........

Perhaps a sea urchin.........?????

That sounds like a cobbler, friend of mine got nailed by one. Cobblers hang around in the weed, can be in the shallows right on the shoreline in places where there's not much swell getting in. Extremely painful, but hot water eases pain dramatically. My mate surfed for 3 hours after being stung and only realised he had an issue when he got home. From that point he was entirely incapacitated. Maybe he should've kept surfing? Anyway, took 3 or 4 hours of moaning and hot water top ups before the pain eased. Need to be careful you don't burn yourself with the water, apparently quite easy to do when you're looking for relief.

I shuffle my feet along the bottom going through any weed. No idea if that really makes any difference but it's good to feel I'm proactively managing the situation. Whimpering is comforting too, in a flash gordon poking his hand in the tree stump kind of way.

www.seabreeze.com.au/Forums/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=44805
biomedicalsciences.unimelb.edu.au/departments/pharmacology/engage/avru

Yeah what ever it was after about 5 hours of hot water the pain spread and eventually I could keep my foot out of the hot water. Eventually I got sick of topping up the hot water so I tried some Denocorub a woolly sock in an Ugg boot which after an hour feels like your foot is on fire from the heat........and took my mind of the pain ;) and at lest I could get outside and wash my gear off ;) not sure if it actually worked but hey the idea was good........;)

Two strong painkillers and a good night's sleep left me with a slightly stiff foot and but all good the next day........

PS I also had a spoon of HTFU syrup ...:)

I have a fifteen year old son who reacts badly to anything that nature serves up that can sting. ie ants, bees, bluebottles, sea lice, etc.

I don't know if this will work for whatever is stinging you guys in WA, but my Mrs is into anything alternative health and I have seen the results on myself as well as my young bloke of a homeopathic remedy called Ledum. Comes in little pills or drops.

I have used vinegar, hot water, urine some creams from the chemist (maybe called Stingoff) and most of them help to some degree but never saw anything work to reduce swelling like Ledum.

I have sat there with a stupid look on my face and watched the swelling from a bad blue bottle sting disappear in seconds.

If you can get rid of the swelling early then they don't seem to end up as itchy a few days later.

There are other homeopathic remedies that are reputed to have a similar effect. Might be a case of horses for courses.

I am no Homeothapist so don't take anything posted here as a substitute for your own medical advice.

BTW patmchale, HTFU juice is useless unless Chopper Reid serves it up to you.

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breathe said...

I have not tried Safe Sea, but I know that people use it in the States.

I'm going to buy some and give it a go... stuff is cheap and worth a go I reckon. I'll report what I find...

Great discovery Breathe! Good on ya. Shipping from the states is about three times the price of the actual cream itself (ref their website). Have you found anywhere to buy it here in Aus?