Help! I'm allergic to maggots!

[The Flying Tench]

I thought there must be some other explanation, but I'm pretty sure. About half an hour or an hour after starting to fish with maggots my wrist and hands start to itch strongly, and sometimes parts of my feet, too. I know, I know, no clever remarks necessary! First I thought it might be the dye in red maggots, but it's been almost as bad since I switched to white. It's not a major problem, cos it stops quickly once I get home and wash my hands, but it's still a nuisance.

 

Has anyone else experienced this? Any suggestions how to avoid it? OK, I realise someone will HAVE to say use another bait!

[chesters1]

A twist on Timothy 4:3 4

Are you on tramadol

Pink rather than red?

Edited July 17, 2015 by chesters1

[Phone]

Tench,

 

There must be a bazillion different flys. Are all fishing maggots from the same species of fly? Use wasp grub.

 

Phone

[gozzer]

I had a mate who started to get a reaction whenever he fished with maggot. It just started one day, after about 30 yrs with no problem. The Doc thought it might be a reaction to the ammonia they produce, because the reaction was worse in warm weather. He took antihistamine which helped, along with riddling the maggots and adding clean bran/sawdust. If it was really bad he used to wear those thin latex gloves.

I'd try antihistamine tablets first John, and see if they ease the problem.

 

John.

[Cyranne12]

A small packet of "Wet-Wipes" may ease the problem while you are on the bank.

[OTIB]

I have the same problem, so I take anti-h before I have to handle the things, happily I only have to use the little blighters in the river closed season.

 

Make sure you use the non drowsy ant h as you will soon be nodding off

[Steve Walker]

Cleaning and riddling them might help, could be something on their skins from their, erm, diet.

[Andy_1984]

Andy Macfarlane started getting an odd reaction in summer that he put down to maggots as it only happened when using them. He would get lots of itchy little spots on the back of his hands. This only started happening the last few years of his life.

 

The exact same thing happened to me only a few weeks ago after using maggots with a small 1" cluster appearing on back of one hand. Andy got it bad on both hands covering almost all the back.

 

Last we spoke about it im sure his doc said it was possibly the maize flour but dont quote me on that.

[John S]

I was going to suggest latex gloves too, but you could first try riddling and washing all the maize off them and use groundbait instead.

[Chris Plumb]

Phone - most maggot in the UK are from Blow Fly (Bluebottles) You also get Pinkies which are smaller (from Green bottle flies - IIRC) and Squats which are smaller still (from little house flies) The latter used almost exclusive as ground bait as they tend not to wriggle into silt...

 

 

Tench,

 

There must be a bazillion different flys. Are all fishing maggots from the same species of fly? Use wasp grub.

 

Phone