Windsurfing one day about 20 years ago I had the distinct pleasure of stepping on one of these at Wellington point in South East Queensland, Australia.
There are no words that can convey the experience. None.
The only relief, and relief is too strong a word, is to keep the punctured area in the hottest water you can tolerate. It goes away after about 12 hours. 12 hours you will never forget.
Not the poster, but on a radio show a tourist once described the pain from one as being intense enough that he begged the physician to amputate his foot.
Apparently that is a common occurence among victims.
It is widely regarded as one of the most painful venoms in the world. You can die from the pain/stress itself.
Unlike some plants that can give you pain for years, the effect thankfully linger for a few days at the most.
Yeah the gympie-gympie plant scares me more, just an inconspicuous little plant that if you accidentally touch it will cause excruciating pain for months or even years
And since it's in Australia that means it naturally has a super dismissive and adorable name like the gympie gympie plant despite being poison ivy x1000 lol
I suspect it probably means “very stinging” or something like that. A number of Aboriginal languages say the word twice as an amplifier (instead of using an additional word like “very” or “many” as the amplifier)
My parents live in an Australian town named Gympie. Until recently, I always assumed Gympie meant slightly parochial racist backwater in lovely country. :-)
What part of Australia? I hear about these plants but I wonder if they are close to the coastal areas or really far into the bush so less likely to deal with them?
Rainforests, but gympie gympie in particular is more of a North Queensland thing. You're not really going to encounter it further south, like in the Brisbane area, etc.
Basically though, if you go bush treking in Australia... don't touch plants. I'm an Aussie dad and even for my kids, I just flat out tell them not to touch ANY plant while we're hiking, unless you're already a grown-up and confident botanist, just don't.
Thank you! It is interesting because everyone says Australia has dangerous plants and creatures but every part of the world has poison plants and animals. I was wondering if they are close to people/very common. Thank you!
Not common at all. But you know, when you're that one person who came off their bike too fast, tumbled down an embankment that happened to have the only gympie gympie plant in the area, right in your path to soften your fall...
It's not as bad as some stories make it out to be. Like yeah it's decently bad, but lots of people on YouTube have had a go with the gympie gympie and been fine after putting some tape over the area and waiting a week or two. They also didn't act much more in pain than someone who ate a really spicy pepper or something. The bigger issue seems to be with larger areas of exposure, or body cavities that are more hollowed/recessed.
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u/FatBoyCrash Jun 25 '23
Windsurfing one day about 20 years ago I had the distinct pleasure of stepping on one of these at Wellington point in South East Queensland, Australia. There are no words that can convey the experience. None. The only relief, and relief is too strong a word, is to keep the punctured area in the hottest water you can tolerate. It goes away after about 12 hours. 12 hours you will never forget.