The Forum contributor Molineux has been hospitalized before because of an infection he acquired via being pierced by a rose thorn.

Wear your gloves people. I got stuck by a rose thorn which the tip broke off of. That was a month ago there is a raised area on my third finger that is still tender even though it is completely healed.

I tend to wear gloves when my purpose it working on the roses, but not when doing weeding. This means I do get thorns from thistles (part of my garden is in a previously wild area), and occasionally from roses. I am scrupulous about digging them out, soaking, using antibiotic. I weed by sense of touch more than by sight, but really, gloves are wisest policy.

Bouquet, I'm happy to hear that your mother is better now. What a relief that must be to you.

Rosefolly

Alisande on the rose forum had some major problems recently too from thorns. I wear gloves but they're usually not leather, but cloth or nitrile which are not much protection. I'll try to be more scrupulous about wearing leather when deadheading. Thanks for the reminder.

I'm glad your mom is better.

Same here, I will wear gloves when doing heavy pruning or planting, but yesterday I was weeding without gloves (I get a better grip on the weeds barehanded) and sure enough, I managed to get a thorn in my thumb. Probably because I was near my compost pile where I toss all my clippings. But I have this great new thing to help with those nasty thorns:

{{gwi:270023}}

Link

Thanks everyone for the well wishes. And Buford, what a nifty tool! I will add that to the gloves I will be sending her for Mothers Day.

What is that cool thing called, Buford?

bouquet, I'm glad to hear your mom is fine now. That's a good reminder for us, thank you!

Since your mom has had some lymph nodes removed and is also diabetic, she might want to consider adding these to her garden:

Basye's Blueberry (medium pink shrub rose with bright yellow stamens)
Nur Mahal (deep pink hybrid musk)
Pacific Serenade (a yellow miniature rose with fairly good-sized blooms)

In my garden, these three are 100% thornless, even underneath the leaf mid-ribs. They all three have fragrance, with 'Basye's Blueberry' being the strongest.

Thanks again for the reminder that we should be careful.

Randy

I hope your mom will be all well very soon. As the wife of a diabetic, I know the dangers and I try to preach it but it often falls on deaf ears. Another thing is people with blood dyscrasias or on blood thinners. I am married to a diabetic on blood thinners who some days looks as though he has been in a combat zone. Yes, I warn him that he could bleed to death but he is a butt-head.

Last year I think I posted a recommendation for rose growers to update their tetanus shots. This was suggested in my heirloom rose newsletter.

Since I was headed for my yearly physical I got one easily. Later I remembered I had gotten one 3 years ago when I got in the middle of a dog fight (I lost). No ill effects of 2 shots.

Denise

Goatskin gloves, everybody! I will not do any activity that involves touching rose canes without wearing one of my pairs of rose gloves.

It's a magnifier tweezer. I used to be able to do it with plain eyesight, but now I need a tweezer. I just used it to remove a thorn remnant from my thumb. IF you click on the link, you can order it. It's only $6.95.

Antother disease that you can also get is sporotrichosiss
rose thorn disease.

Here is a link that might be useful: sporotrichosiss

One thing my mother the nurse always had us do after a puncture wound was make it bleed freely (assuming it's deep enough to draw blood). It helps flush contaminants out of the injury. Hasn't been a problem with some of the latest thorn attacks (the gloves didn't even slow them down)--getting the bleeding to stop is another issue! :-(

A macabre yet interesting footnote of medical history is that the first patient to be treated with penicillin had been infected by a rose thorn. The treatment was somewhat successful - they didn't have/use enough penicillin and the infection returned and ultimately killed the patient. Wikipedia has more info on the incident: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Alexander.

I can't remember how I first heard of this but I do remember to scrub my hands & forearms after working in the rose garden.

Sincere "Thank You" for a kick in my oblivious head... I always come inside with my hands and arm bleeding, itching and swelling... stupid I know, I must learn to enjoy working in gloves. My nails would love it too, I'm sure. I simply can not clarify my resistance to wearing gloves. I use to think it was because I was going out to fetch the mail and noticed something in a rose plant, then hours later... But that's not it, I have gloves right there in my tools, and move them around out of my way to get another tool... so why is it a challenge to just put them on? I'd love to understand this resistance!
Bouquet, I'm so glad all is well now, and also I agree, tetanus up to date is very important (the time frame use to be every five years, yet now some are every ten years, so be sure of your protection) and I would also like to understand the itching and swelling. And do we develope any resistance with constant exposure?

I saw a "House" episode in which a guy had some strange ailment which put him near death (that is, of course, every episode!) but in the end it was attributed to a rose thorn injury.......I know some of the stuff on that show is highly exaggerated but still, I thought -yikes! - there is probably some truth to it and now after reading this thread.........well, I better get my gloves on, too!

Lynn

Three things happened to me almost simultaneously:
1. Read this thread.
2. Really ripped and pricked myself while deadheading.
3. Bought goat skin gloves! They're really GREAT (and I react to tetanus shots).

I got the sporo thing about 15 years ago, put up with it way too long (May to AUg) went to the doc who biopsied the bump (fortunately slow-moving thing)and I took oral fungicide. The calloused joint on the finger has never returned to "normal".
WEAR GLOVES PEOPLE!

Yes, as Duchesse said, I had a rose thorn stab that required surgery last summer. I had two sticks, actually, and my right index finger still isn't right.

You'd think I'd have learned, yes? Wrong! I'm very, very good about putting on my gloves when I set out to work in the garden. But the dangerous times are when I'm walking past the garden, on my way in or out of the house, and I just happen to see a weed that needs to be pulled right that second.

This is what I was doing yesterday when I took a thorn hit in that same index finger. It nicked a vein, which swelled up immediately, so I was a little concerned. But it's fine now. Whew! I will try to think of my self as wearing blinders when I'm not wearing gloves.

I'm glad to hear your mom is okay, Bouquet.

Thanks to all for this important information! Bodica, are your gloves comfortable to wear? Are they practical to use? Did they cost a sum so great that you will hesitate to replace them when they wear out? These are the three points of resistance that occur to me.
Melissa

Good to see that this post was useful to so many. Right before this happened to my mom, I had yanked out my huge Mutabilis. Got tired of the major haircut it needed several times a year. Thanks again to everyone for the helpful hints.

Hello
I got a rose thorn in my left thumb in March 2010. I thought I got it all out, however it is huring bad now and I can hardly bend it. I have been trying PRID drawing salve. I have tried wrapping bacon around it. These are old wives tales, but they are not working. When I try to bend my thumb back up on the first groove it makes a popping sound and it hurts terribly. Has anybody gone through this? Thanks

My worst rose thorn injury was when I was hacking down some giant canes of cherokee rose. A big thorn went right into mu finger. I was really hard to pull out. I went into Kaiser after a few days because it was really sore. They xrayed it, & found that the thorn actually penetrated the bone on my finger. Took a few weeks before it felt normal. Those goat gloves sound great! I'll put them on my xmas list

sherose, see a doctor! No more time for waiting around.

sherose, you put bacon on it? Go to the doctor immediately. You could wind up losing your thumb or use of it. Don't mess around with wives tales.