Ant bites

[Just Jack]

What is the best way to treat ant bites. Yesterday, I sat down on an ant hill. I was swarmed in the blink of an eye. I tried to brush them off but only got more bites on my hands, must have a dozen bites on my hands, and yes, I was wearing shorts--another dozen bites on my legs. I don't think they were fire ants--just those little red pi$$ ants.
Man, they itch something terrible. I had some of them bleeding from scratching them last night. Today they are just red whelps with a water blister on top of them. Do I pop the blister. All I had at the time to put on them was Bag Balm. Anybody else had a run-in with ants? What kind of treatment did you use?

[fiddlehead]

Living in the tropics, we have lots of them.
We use tiger balm which is very similar to Vicks vapor rub.

[bloodmountainman]

Try Listerine mouthwash on the bites.... relieves itching!

[JaxHiker]

Witch hazel usually works also.

[Bear Cables]

When I was on the trail I found that hand sanitizer worked well on bites. I'm sure it's the alcohol that dries it up.

[Blissful]

Need to use hydrocortisone, 1% ointment. The itching also can cause infection, so monitor them. If they get inflamed, go see a Dr. But I would go anyway with that many bites.

[Tennessee Viking]

The pink stuff

Rubbing Alcohol

Benedryl pills & Cream

[adventurousmtnlvr]

Home remedies would be bicarbonate of soda (dip rag and put on the area). Mustard pack would also work ... coat the area (although on the trail might interest bears ,lol).

medically I agree with most of the previous people. KEY is immediate treatment ... don't wait even one minute. Put alcohol first (from a first aide kit, hand sanitizer etc) ... helps begin the drying process to lesson the time. Antibiotic would be needed since you blistered up ... and you should see a doctor for that (medically speaking). Antihistamin would help. the aforementioned things like neosporin (also in most trail med kits), benedryl, bacitracin, hydrocortisone that sort of thing. all these were mentioned earlier though.

the problem now is that you waited too long so while some initial visual things go away, blisters can form a couple days afterward go away and reform. I wouldn't pop them ... you invite infection. Best wishes, I'm allergic to some remedies and have bites (even minor) for a month or more. Let's hope you aren't one of those :o

[mudhead]

Afterbite pen. Sold at Walmart.

You can test this at home, by dipping a Q-tip in ammonia, and dabbing an ant bite.

It has worked for me with those "orange" red ants. The mean ones.