What worked for me was "OFF", to prevent them, every time I worked in the afflicted garden. If I didn't start the "OFF" early enough in the season, I put depilatory on the itch until it stung. No more itch. I would rather have ouch than itch.

Cath

Hi Bluegirl: I love your sense of humor ... I google "picture of chiggers bite" and totally freak out. We are going to retire in Alaska, I have a chiggerphobia.

Oooo, chiggers! I remember those.

If you wear clothing which is totally inappropriate for the hot climate, you can prevent a chunk of the little buggers from getting to your skin. Wear long pants tucked into boots. Spraying the boots and clothing will probably come as close as you'll get to a guarantee that no chiggers will attack your feet and legs. I usually sprinkled sulphur around the outside of my clothes. It DID seem to help. Keeping weeds and grass under control goes a long way toward removing chigger habitat. They seem to prefer dry places in fields and gardens. After the bite? The usual: Calamine, Benedryl, etc.

They disappear in winter. Of course, so does most of the gardening season.

My sympathies!

Carol

This post was edited by PortlandMysteryRose on Thu, Jul 11, 13 at 17:58

Okay, checklist:

OFF
depilatory
dusting sulfur

Thanks for the suggestions, guys. And for the sympathy! Gee whiz, those things itch--mosquito bites are nothing compared to chiggers.

After spending a day in the Florida woods, my father used to spray himself with DDT before showering.

Sulfur does work as a personal repellent. Just put some in a thin sock and tap it on shoes, pants, hands or gloves, and cuffs.

Have you ever looked up the life cycle of chiggers?
As I understand it, the bite does not bother you. When it leaves your skin (detatches), you have an allergic reaction, and that accounts for the welt.

Therefore after your shower from working outside, and after you have dried off, take the towel, and rub your skin where the elastic was. If you rub it up, you knock off the chigger, and there is no problem. Otherwise, when it leaves in about a day or so, you are in for the welt. I hate chigger bites. I really hate them, and often forget to rub my sock line especially after working outside.

I use Cutter spray, but have heard that it kills the bug when it bites you. However, the bug will crawl up until getting past the spray, and then bite. That is why there are so many bites around the elastic line.

I also hate ants, mosquitoes, and blister beetles. Cicada killing bees freak me out.

It is too hot here. I love summers and hate being cold, but this weather is too much.

My description of the chiggers came from the Ohio agriculture page. It is not exact, but I mentioned it to make the point that we must rub that towel, and the bite we have today probably occurred yesterday or before.

Sammy

Sammy

I'll second the Tecnu suggestion. It does work and works great!!

Grace e

Deepest sympathy, as i claw at my own chigger bites. Nothing but time truly helps. And they don't begin to get better until they've scabbed over. I even have welts on my face. Round 3 with the chiggers. When they write their letter to Santa, they ask for Laura. Bites on my collarbone. Bites on my elbows. Bites everywhere. I hate chiggers.

Hahaha! found this site while searching for chigger remedies. It's almost as funny as the infamous gardenia thread:

"On a friend's advice, I tried alcohol. Lots of it. It did relieve the itching, but I had trouble getting used to the hangovers."

"Bordeaux's Butt Paste works great at removing the itch & redness! "

"Take a very, very hot shower and aim the water on to the bites. Lots of water, lots of soap, rub with a clean wash cloth. You will gasp with pain, but it's worth it. Stop shower when the pain subsides. Dry off, put Listerine on a cotton ball, and wash each bite. Let dry. Put antibiotic ointment on each bite (optional). Take a Benadryl and go to bed."

"... I use a qtip and apply twice so it absorbs in. Generally once a day until the bumb goes away will do, but morning and evening will keep you from looking ridiculous as you try to scratch some of the locations bugs will bite you..."

Most of the remedies seem to work by drying out the swelling caused by the bite (alcohol, witch hazel, calamine). The preventions seem to be general insect repellants--deet, sulfur, various oils.

And I have some FACINATING products to Google: Chiggarrid (I see this one on shelves locally a lot), Chiggaway, & especially Bordeaux's Butt Paste (I don't think I have the guts to actually purchase this one) & Nix (also don't know if I could purchase).

Well, off I go to the store to get a gallon of minty Listerine and a pound of dusting sulfur.

Here is a link that might be useful: chigger help

This post was edited by bluegirl on Fri, Jul 12, 13 at 10:49

I am shuddering in sympathy.

Very funny! Old Spice, cayenne pepper, vaseline, ammonia, Foot Mud Mask, Chlorox, an ACE bandage, etc. The most popular seemed to be mouthwash. Lou

Man, this site just gets funnier & funnier. Haven't finished yet, but I bet napalm gets mentioned before it ends:

" ..I took a very warm shower and scrubbed with Epsom salts. Then I used dog flea and tick bath on my feet. I know, I know, not supposed to be used on humans. Yeah, well chiggers aren't supposed to be on humans either...."

"...The best that we have found is a warm bath with diluted Pine sol in the water, soak for about 10 to 20 minutes...."

"...Wet the skin area where you were bitten and then rub some concrete powder or masonry mix just on the bite... "

"... add 3 cap fulls of concentrated lysol to a full bath tub of water. Take bath in the water..."

"...fill the bath tub with warm water, add about one-half to one cup of bleach, and soak in the bath for about five minutes (don't put bleach water on face or hair); after soaking for five minutes, shower and wash with soap. ... Don't repeat baths with bleach - it won't help. Some 'bravo' men I know rub undiluted bleach onto bare skin. I don't recommend undiluted bleach on skin. "

"Listen, I'm not recommending this remedy to anyone else, I just want to let everyone know how much this has worked for me.... Floor cleaning, mopping Ammonia, full strength on a cotton ball! "

"...I dont know if it was this or the muriad of pain I've inflicted on myself trying to stop the insanity but I HAVEN'T ITCHED ONCE since appying and the bites seem less irritated. .."

"I look like ive been attacked by a severly angered cat. ... i'm off to make use of the peroxide, alcohol, and meat tenderizer. PLAESE GOD LET THEM WORK!! I'm SO FLIPPING TIRED!"

"I was suffering from being eaten alive by these chiggers I had bites all over my body they itched like crazy until ,I found pure acetone..."

"...saturate the area with cheap hairspray..."

"...petroleum jelly works the best."

"I had some Flanders Buttocks Cream and remebered the Buttpaste remedy..."

"i'm going to be very very honest here. nothing exactly works. the best thing i have done is to get a wash cloth and wipe alcohol all over my bites. ...go to the doctor!!! they will give you a shot in the butt that will stop itching AND they will give you a mild anti-psychotic to help with the 'going crazy' feeling. believe me, i was where you're at not too long ago and it sucks. i felt like crying during the night because the itching woke me up all through the night. GO TO THE DOCTOR!!! it's the only thing that actually 'helps' there are things that you can do like the chiggerex and alcohol that are very very short term. GO TO THE DOCTOR!! you want that shot in you butt. trust me! it will make the itching stop for 48 hours. "

Give yourself a laugh & check this site out.

Okay, finished, so this is last cut&paste, I promise. Apparently, most treatments work by either mechanically or chemically removing the entire section of skin surrounding the bite! But reading this website has made me laugh hard enough to forget about scratching for the past hour.

"Apply table salt to the wet washcloth. Rub the washcloth on the affected areas of the skin, avoiding the genitals. It may hurt a little..."

"... I cut a lemon in half (you could also use lemon juice) and rubbed it on all of the itching spots, left it on for about 5 minutes (it will probably really sting!!) and then wiped it off with a towel. That helped the itching alot but i was still a little irritated so i took some olive oil...

" use lye soap"

"Try Lye from a hair perm kit or Monistat Yeast Infection Cream.."

"...SCALDING hot water aimed directly on the bites..."

"...take the end of a cigarette and hold it close enough to burn the bite and it would stop the itching immediately and never return. .."

"... take a sharp knife and stab the sharp end directly into the middle of the bite...."

"...I have finally found a remedy: BLEACH. Not a bleach bath, that works for a few minutes,... Instead, douse a washcloth with plain beach, soak the washcloth in water, and then scrub the bites with the cloth. ..."

"...Use Old Spice mens heavy duty under arm deoderent..."

"... scratch'em 'til they're raw, put hairspray on them, and get ready to dance..."

"... 1 oz bottle of Tea Tree
• ½ teaspoon dish washing liquid--allows emulsification of the juice and oil
• ½ teaspoon Cayenne pepper
• 2 oz fresh pineapple juice. ..."

"... I place a lit cigarett near the bite and hold it close enough to feel the heat and a bit of a sting the itch will go away for good...."

". Scratch every single one of them, get them to bleed. Damp alchohol on a paper towel and rub it on your wounds.

"...Then I took 3 Benedryl alergy capsules (box said take 2)..."

"...Use Super Clean (engine cleaner)..."

"...When applying any formula with Cayenne included, avoid touching the eyes, inside of the nose, genital area and the butt crack. WASH your hands immediately ..."

These 2 preventatives sound interesting:

"... by taking 25 mg of manganese (as in manganese gluconate or Albion chelated manganese) daily, I could PREVENT the bad inflammation and itching. ..."

"Old Army way of dealing with Chiggers is prevention. A simply way to avoid chigger bites is to rub a homemade lotion containing powder/flour of sulfur (10% by volume to lotion) and any kind of cheap skin lotion (coconut lotion from the dollar store). Place ingredients in a mixing bowl. Mix them together with a cake mixer until uniformed and apply to every inch of your body. Chiggers, Ticks, and any kind of mite hates sulfur and have so since recorded time. I have used this for 30 years for both Chiggers and Deer Ticks and works everytime. (Caution: Do not use if allergic to sulfur...duh)"

I love the conspiratorial tone of some of the advice: "hey, don't tell 'em I told you to do this, but.."

I'm a believer in applying clear nail polish to the bite. Yes, I know the chigger is gone and it's just the inflammation, but it's gotta be doing something because it stops the itch! Even if it's just a placebo, it still works for me.

Sorry should have specified. The poison ivy soap and scrub worked for chiggers. Brand is tecnu. It took the itch right off

Grace e

Domeboro solution is the best astringent I've ever found that really helps with itching. I've only used it for Black Spot Poison Ivy, but if it helps that itch, it'll help about any itch, I think.

(I get a spot or two of BSPI at least every couple of years here. I have an Ancient Poison Ivy Stump from Hell ;) It's over 100 years old and looks like bonzai. It's not big, but it's very mean! :D )

Thanks, I'll check those out. I spent today grubbing out weeds & raking mulch. I mixed some sulfur into a jar of body lotion & slathered it on beforehand--we'll see how that works--so far no itching.

Uhmm, by the time I go to the drugstore, reeking of sulfur, & pick up Nix lice shampoo, Buttpaste, Monostat, industrial strength ammonia, acetone, lye, a gallon of Cool & Minty Listerine & an Ace bandage they probably won't want to touch my money.

BTW, I tried heating the worst welt with a cigarette--dang if it doesn't work! Maybe it dries the thing out. We used to paint them with nail polish, too--& it does seem to give some relief.

Back when we had cows in that heavily infested pasture we finally had a doctor give us some pills--think they were called Timeryl. He said they gave them to kids miserable with Chickenpox. It made me pretty groggy but at least I could sleep.

(ETA: It's Temeril--a steroid with antihistamine--& it looks like it's just for vet use now. Too bad)

This post was edited by bluegirl on Mon, Jul 15, 13 at 0:25

For all insect bites, spider bites and various types of bee stings, I use the aloe vera they sell in the drug store for sunburn. (You can use use the juice from an aloe vera plant, but it stains my skin yellow.)

Last year I disturbed a yellow jacket nest and the dang things followed me into to house as I ran for the aloe vera. As soon as I put the stuff on, the sting went away.

Will it work for chiggers ? I don't know. I do know it doesn't work for poison oak, but it has worked for other kinds of rashes.

Let us know if you do find something that works.

Smiles,
Lyn

Great thread----lots of good ideas

Florence

The heat might work like it does for bee stings. If you put a bee sting under a stream of the hottest water you can stand from the sink, it will cook the protein that causes the sting and after the redness from the hot water goes away, the area stops hurting.

(speaking softly because i have only two chigger bites right now).....hottest water and ALL those other remedies work...for about two hours each.

I'd rather use the aloe vera. It works immediately and the itch doesn't come back. Also, it feels cool compared to hot water.

Smiles,
Lyn

Wow, I think the sulfur added to the lotion really worked well as a repellant. Added a teaspoon or so into a jar of hand lotion & mixed it up. Slathered it on all over--including on the skin under underclothes lines where the devils like to bite & on the legs & feet.

Only had one small new bite after working all day in tall grass & mulch--on the wrist. I was wearing shorts & a tank top--yeah, I wanted to put it to the acid test.

So, the "old army formula" worked well for me.

Bloody Hell - we get 'em here (harvest mites)....along with some vicious ants, all living in our woods where hot showers and all that are not going to happen since our only water is either non-potable stuff from the old dairy stand-pipe or what we bring ourselves in containers. Being complete townies, we knew nothing about these horrible 'country' pests and every time we get to stay in the horsebox, we spend much time comparing our weals, bumps, spots and lesions. We quickly hacked down the vegetation around the truck and have cut several 'rides' through the wood but, at this time of year, there are no visits through the nettles to the river edge. We are absolutely not ready for the final leap into the unknown (getting our own water supply is the most crucial) but I do know that I only venture forth covered top to toe in my winter gardening clothes (leather trousers, waxed cotton jacket, wool base layers) - thankfully, the woods are always cool at least.

Saturday I got two chigger bites, one on the ankle and one on the wrist. I decided to do an experiment so I put clear fingernail polish on the ankle and rubbed Chigger X into the wrist. Within an hour both had stopped itching and were no longer red. I'm wondering if I had good success because I got to them fast. Maybe that's the key rather than the particular potion used. (?)

Of course, prevention is the best way to go. Lou

Slightly burning the skin works best for me, though I also add clear nailpolish. I would rather deal with a small burn than an itch! :-)
LoL

When I was looking at ChiggerRid & ChiggerRx plus others, the active ingredients tended to be ammonia, alcohol & various plant oils. Some had topical anesthetics (Sting Kill), some antihistamines. So most of the home remedies are versions of OTC stuff.

Still itch free. I was very careful to always get out of gardening clothes fast & do a hot, soapy, hard-scrubbing shower, but I still had quite a few very bad bites. Using the sulfur lotion (& the usual soapy scrub) reduced the bites to virtually zero & the one or two bites I got were very mild--maybe they didn't hang on long & cause a bad bite--I dunno, but the difference was remarkable.

Lots of replies but I'd might as well join in:
It's a three stage process.

1. No later than the middle of August, (in Delaware) make sure the area you think the chiggers call home is mowed, and/or sprayed with a good outdoor insecticide spray. Then make sure you use something with deet in it to spray around your shoe tops, sock tops and pants legs.

2. Because you just realized you've got a dandy case of chiggers and had forgotten number one, you should try to kill the chiggers that may be still sucking at the feeding tube (?) they inject the digestive enzyme that causes the pimples and itch. I use something with deet in it to lightly spray my legs up to the knees at least.* (It is said that chiggers don't burrow in but insert a feeding tube.)

3. Now use a dilute solution of vinegar and water in a very small basin. (I use a cup and a half of vinegar that seems about the right for the amount of WARM water). The reason for this is to neutralize as best you can, the digestive fluid already in your skin. A little soap will help the mixture to penetrate. (hopefully) Take your time and give the solution time to work. Do NOT use a towel. Let it dry.

*I used to take a shower with a cake of dog flea soap which seemed to help (as soon as I realized I had chiggers). This does nothing to immediately stop the itch, but at least it prevents more places that itch. It is best to remember to do number one, but I never do. I walk through weeds on my way to the compost heap and get chiggers almost every year. This year was bad I think because of the frequent rains.

The secret ingredient of remedies like Tecnu is a highly effective surfectant (detergent agent). I understand that some of the heavy- duty hand cleaners sold for auto mechanics, such as Goop, have the same ingredient at a more reasonable price. Gentler and less dangerous, too, than kerosine and ammonia. (BTW an ingredient of some of these hand cleansers is Nonoxynol-9, the same that is used in contraceptive jelly). Also fabulous for stain removal, so they say.

If they get out of control I use the Cutter yard spray which also keeps mosquitoes and ticks down. Comes in a hose-end sprayer so it's easy to use. Good thing my hose reaches!
I never go out in the chigger-y area without long pants tucked into thick socks, boots. Lots of Deep Woods Off-- I treat the skin area first then my socks and boots.
Anywhere I think I've been bitten, I hit it with Afterbite-- this is an applicator that has ammonia in it. Looks like a magic marker and it really helps.