Nasty Creepy Crawlies

Well, as Ed has said earlier, all of the flora and fauna here wants to either sting you or bite you.

One of the things everyone has warned us about, are the “Processionary Caterpillars”. The moth lays it’s eggs on the south side of pine trees in the summer. The ‘worms’ eat the pine needles and live together in a nest, containing up to 300 of the little blighters. They come out at night and feed, then in the daytime, the sun warms up the nest, and aids their digestion. In the beginning, it is very hard to see the nests, but as they get bigger, the nest grows, making them easy to spot. On misty days, the moisture clings to them, and then you seem to be able to see them everywhere.

The worms grow into caterpillars, which have long hairs, which secrete a very nasty toxic substance. If children get it in their eyes, they can go blind for a while. Animals too are badly affected. Needless to say, having lots of pines, we checked out garden regularly for nests. Sure enough, we spotted 2 in our garden, and one overhanging from next door. Ed cut the branches off, and poured diesel on them and set fire to them. Even doing this, you have to be careful not to inhale the fumes, so nasty are they.

When the caterpillars are ready to leave the nest, they all march together, nose to tail, (hence processionary) and climb down from the tree, travel along the ground, until they find somewhere nice and soft to bury themselves in, in order to pupate into moths. This is when they are at their most dangerous – on the ground, where anyone can encounter them. We haven’t seen them marching, but, they leave a trail of toxic ‘slime’ wherever they have been.

Sadly, today (Monday 11^th Feb) the puppies must have encountered a trail. They were fine at lunchtime, but this afternoon, Paddy was slobbering, and very ill. Max soon started slobbering too. A quick dash to the vets was in order. They weren’t yet open when we got there, but we were 3^rd in the queue. However, the staff obviously knew this was a poisoning issue, and we went in first, as soon as the vet arrived. She took one look at Paddy’s tongue, and confirmed that it was ‘processionary’ poisoning. The poor things could hardly stand up. They had both been sick in the car, and cried while we were waiting to go in. The vet gave them 2 injections (anti-inflammatory and antibiotic) and a supply of pills. They have to go back on Friday, in case they get necrosis of the tongue, and lose part of it. They can’t swallow anything. They can’t even drink. We have to squirt cold water into their mouths.

They were both sick several times on the way home, and again in the evening. Hopefully, they have got rid of a lot of the toxins. Paddy is very quiet, Max at least is able to lick his mouth. Tomorrow we have to hand feed them small amounts of mashed up food, using a syringe. They are likely to be ill for the next 3 days.

The worst part is, we haven’t even seen where they picked the toxin up from. It was obviously in the garden, but we only have 1 nest (too high to reach and destroy) and that is still intact. They must have come from a neighbours garden, and crossed through ours. Next year, we will pay, and get everyone’s garden around here sprayed. It will be about €50.