Personal Sharing For Your Benefit

For outdoor folks, especially those that pursue wildlife with camera, bow, or gun, the following information is likely something you already know. For others you may learn something new in these comments.

Pursuers of wildlife often have specific clothing they wear to go outside. Typically those clothes are camo-patterned to match the habitat where outdoor activities occur. Often the clothes receive special laundering to avoid fading and scents that give warning to wildlife with sensitive noses.

Recently I went into hiding along a river bank to photograph wood ducks and/or hooded mergansers. My photographic endeavors produced no results, but the nap I enjoyed was outstanding. What I did not realize was I dozed of in a location where poison ivy thrives. Somehow I transferred poison ivy urushiol (juice) from the plant to my outdoor clothes. The clothes then moved the urushiol to my skin in many locations.

For the past couple of weeks I have been dealing with blistering skin on my hands, forearms, and my legs. The itching is maddening as the blisters are touched by anything I wear. It takes all I have to remain respectable instead of scratching my itches.

The morals of the story…

• Watch where you lay down when you are going to take a nap in the outdoors.

• Wash clothing in hot water with detergents.

• Repeat washing.

• Rinse clothing.

• Resist the temptation to scratch your skin off.

On another topic…

The photo for today was one of the brightest colored male red-winged blackbirds I have seen close up. He had claimed a nesting area and was not going to let me scare him off.