The Heat...how are you coping?

[Katie]

got poison ivy once from a bonfire

I thought that burning the darn stuff would be the best way to get rid of it, but the locals just about had a fit! Apparently the oils travel in the smoke and will cover everything, including your lungs Good think I mentioned it to someone who knew better before lighting the match....

We have lots of sumac here, staghorn variety I think. I've never heard of any in that family being poisonous, but my track record isn't that great either Look up 'jewelweed' as a treatment for the ivy. It is a delicate plant I used to call 'touch me nots' as a child, as the seed pods explode if touched on the tip. I had no idea that you could use the leaves to make a soothing tea/poultice.

[Catherine]

Katie, sadly, I don't have horses any longer. Not for the last three years. I do miss the babies. Maybe some day I'll be able to ride them again. When I did have them we were at about 7000' elevation and the bugs were really only bad for about a month. The poor things did suffer and I hated spraying them with bug spray, but nothing else seemed to help them. And they were grateful, as soon as we would start spraying one the whole group would come up and stand waiting in line!
I have heard stories of people burning fires that contained poisonous plants and the smoke really making people sick who were allergic. Luckily, I don't have any of the reactions either. I'm sure I've come in contact with something at one time or other with all my traipsing through the forests, but no rashes ever.

[Catherine]

I forgot to add above but I must take back my gloating. It was actually 98 degrees here today! But at least it should be back in the upper 80's tomorrow.

[KanRunMo]

Katie - the scoop on poisonous sumac. Yikes. I've never known anyone to get it but it sounds terrible.

Poison sumac (Toxicodendron vernix or Rhus vernix) is a woody shrub or small tree growing to 7 m (20 ft) tall.[1] All parts of the plant contain a resin called urushiol that causes skin and mucous membrane irritation to humans. When burned, inhalation of the smoke may cause the rash to appear on the lining of the lungs, causing extreme pain and possibly fatal respiratory difficulty.
Poison sumac grows exclusively in very wet or flooded soils, usually in swamps and peat bogs, in the eastern United States and Canada.
In terms of its potential to cause urushiol-induced contact dermatitis, poison sumac is far more virulent than its relatives poison ivy and poison oak. According to some botanists, poison sumac is the most toxic plant species in the United States (Frankel, 1991).
The poison shows itself in painful and long continued swellings and eruptions.[1]

[Katie]

I'm going to have to find some pictures before taking any more walks in the woods! All the sumac I know grows in dry, gravelly soils...must be a completely different variety, of which I better be ware

[KBear]

Heat in Texas.... We are having record breaking heat, we are on the 27th straight day in a row with over 100 F temp. Rain??? What's that? We haven't had rain in about 45 days. No relief in sight, our low temp this week will be Saturday with a breezy 100 F, at night it's been getting down to 85 or 86 F. I've lived here my entire life and don't ever remember a Summer when we weren't having a a drought at some point. Our lakes (where we get our drinking water) are down about 13 feet each, losing right at 1 inch a day. We are on phase 2 water restriction, which is no watering on certain days, no watering between 8 am to 6 pm and most restaurants will not bring water automatically, you have to ask for it. I guess I'm just used to the heat, because while it is hot, we are in Texas and that is the price we pay for mild Winters.

In my house though, it's a breezy 73, dropping to 68 F at night I actually where a jacket inside, because I'm cold and hubby is always hot (he does have to work outside in this heat). I don't even want to think about my electric and water bill that will be arriving any day now.....

Sadly every Summer there are several children killed that are left in vehicles 'on accident'. This year there was one where the parents were home, little girl home, they called and reported her missing, police searched for hours, only to find she had gone outside, gotten in the family car and died. We also lose a lot of the elderly this time of year, as some have broken AC's or simply can't afford the electric bill to run the AC. Luckily there are several programs to help these people and they talk about them on the news daily, so many do get help.

On the poisonous plants, we have tons of the stuff in any wooded or unkept areas. Every year my husband does a clean up job for one of his customers (he's a landscaper), it is behind the business that backs up to a creek. It is covered in poison ivy, oak and sumac. One year we had an employee we had to get to the ER because his reaction was so bad (that was the first year and no one realized that all the poisonous plants were there.) My husband had to get a shot at the doctor's office to help with his. Well since then, we have found out that if you are exposed to it (or might have been) to take your Dawn dish-washing liquid soap (like you use to wash dishes in the sink) and take a shower using it. It removes the oils from the skin and can keep the reaction at bay if done soon enough. Now we have no issues, though they do wear long sleeves, pants, boots and gloves.... still a couple of spots; but nothing like they had the first time.

[KBear]

Oh and it is dry heat here, I'm putting the baby in a small room at night to sleep with a humidifier as he is an allergy sufferer. Poor thing has been sick for 2+ months running off and on fever and congestion. We go to the dr. about once a week or two and it's the same thing, no ear infection, just congestion, just bear with it. At first they were saying a cold as it's rare for a baby to have allergies. Then they said if there is a strong family history of allergies it could be that. We definitely have a strong family history of it. Ava (my 5 year old) suffers and will get migraines to the point that she will vomit when her allergies are bad (right now). The other night she had a headache and ended up vomiting all over my room and she just cries because it hurts so bad. When I can get her to calm down and go to sleep, then she feels better when she wakes up. My mom, sister and niece all get the same thing. Mine aren't quite that bad, though they seem to worsen with age. Right now it's mainly I have chronic dry eye, the whites of my eyes are seriously red ALL OF THE TIME. I have Rx allergy eye drops and over the counter I use, but they don't do much.

[Nairek]

Heat in Texas.... We are having record breaking heat, we are on the 27th straight day in a row with over 100 F temp. Rain??? What's that?

Well hopefully Tropical Storm Don brings you (safely) some much needed rain. We FINALLY hit our rainy season a few weeks ago. The drought was so bad that the wells in my area were starting to go dry!

[KBear]

Well hopefully Tropical Storm Don brings you (safely) some much needed rain. We FINALLY hit our rainy season a few weeks ago. The drought was so bad that the wells in my area were starting to go dry!

We are hearing the same thing on the news, people's wells are dry and they are having to go deeper to find water. We get lake water as our water, so as of right now, they have periodically let water out of lakes North of us to help out. They are saying that it looks like Don is going to miss us (North Texas), hopefully they are wrong and we get rain.

Thought this was funny, one of our local weathermen posted this on his Facebook late last week
"Don't you get a kick out of the folks in the Northeast whining about their 3 day heat wave? All of a sudden now it's become a National story? Give me a break! They've got a cold front on the way too. Excuse me for my daily rant...carry on..."

Here's one of the comments I thought was funny "They would die...probably literally...if they lived here."

It's all relative.... they make fun of us in the Winter for being pansies and the tables turn in the Summer.