Schmidt Pain Index - for stings

[Stuart Fullerton]

There i was, with leg all done up at the orthopaedic clinic today,
thumbing through a copy of "outside - april l996" and low and behold a
huge picture of my old western friend the Pepsis wasp. The title of the
article was "The King of Sting" featureing none other than Justin O
Schmidt of the USDA. Nice general article filled with all sorts of goodies
such as that it would take about 890 harvester ants to kill an adult if
"according to the movies, an Apache prisoner were stripped naked and tied
to a snake and smeared with honey".

But the one that really got my eye was the Justin O Schmidt Pain Index for
poison bites/stings. of the 10 critters noted, i have had the pleasure of
experience with 7. I certainly do remember by one and only sting by Pepsis
in the late 50's in the southern end of the great central valley of calif.
right on the end of the " ' you" finger. For three days it was swollen and
upright. lots of explainations.  of course i am hypersensative to all the
aculeate stings, one particularly bad  memory of a trip in the middle 60's
in west texas, where i was desiginated driver and got the whammy in both
hands by some species or another of texas bombus. do to excess swelling
put the kibosh on the next three days of collecting for me, as well as
driving. oh well.

truck on over to your local library, get the magazine, and enjoy the
Schmidt  Pain Index.

Justin - if you are out there, thanks.

cheers!!! rof

Stuart M Fullerton ROF, Research Associate in charge of Arthropod
Collections (UCFC), Biology Dept. University of Central Florida, Orlando,
Florida, 32816, USA. stuartf at pegasus.cc.ucf.edu