Scorpion Attack - A Paralyzing Sting in the Grand Canyon

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They know that sleep isn't one size fits all and that's why they offer mattresses for every body, every sleep style, even in hard to find sizes. Plus, Brooklyn Bedding is one of the few mattress brands that's endorsed by the American Chiropractic Association and they're 100% fiberglass free for peace of mind. They also offer a 120 night comfort trial so you'll either love it or they'll help you return it and swap it hassle free. So you don't just have to take my word for it. You can go to BrooklynBedding.com and use our promo code tooth at checkout to get 30% off site wide. This offer is not available anywhere else. That's BrooklynBedding.com and promo code tooth for 30% off site wide. You can support our show and let them know we sent you after checkout. BrooklynBedding.com promo code tooth. Hello everybody in the world. We are Tooth and Claw Podcast. We have our wildlife bear biologist Wes Larson certified. Hey-oh. I'm his little brother. What was that? What is that person? That was two hang loses. Brian Wilson died today. So that's right. So you're excited. Bring in the energy. Is that a surfer thing? Hey-oh? No, hey, they just do hang loose but the hey-oh was that was all Wes Larson. That's your little twist on a classic. Got it. I'm Jeff Larson, Wes's little brother. I'm a bear knower. I know about bears. Sure. And then we got Mike Smith who is our Mike guy. He does Mike. He does our Mike. He works with Mike's. He got the soap bar that Sydney Sweeney sells over like bathwater. Yes. Do you think it's good quality soap or is it just like a sexual thing? No, I'm not. Listen, you know that whole thing where you drop soap in prison? I don't know if this is touchy territory. I don't even need another person to make that like a fun experience anymore. Yeah. I just need me in the soap. You didn't actually buy that soap but whoever, that's a crazy idea. I don't know. Oh, he bought it for sure. I know he bought it. I don't know why you brought prison into the making. He just heard soap and immediately thought prison. Explain. Hey, guys, I broke my resolution. No, dude. I killed a butt. You nuked someone? Oh, that was Jeff. You know that cricket? Yeah, that was Jeff. No nukes. There's a cricket that showed up in our last recording and I had Robin problems and I asked Braxton. I said Braxton was that cricket in there and he said it sure was. Got a comment on it too. I spent some time looking for it and I finally, it finally scurried out and I smushed it. You think he had a family? I hope not, but I did feel bad actually, but I had to do it for the good of the show. So there's no crickets today. I would kill its family too because the family's probably really sad. Well, they might do like a John Wick on me too. You never know. Yeah. So anyway, that's all you know if you would have killed its dog. Well, sick brag, dude. I wasn't bragging. I felt like I had to let people know because I'd been on my pedestal lately about not killing any bugs and I killed this bug and it did make me feel bad. I was in the animal question I want to ask you at the top, Wes. Okay. I was thinking about a grasshopper having or a cricket having a pet dog to kill in order to really set the John Wick stage. Yeah. Are there other animals besides humans that keep other animals as pets? Is there any kind of relationship like that in the natural world? There's like symbiotic relationships and there's relationships like a cleaning station, you know, where a big manta ray will pull in or something and there's all those little grassfish that will eat all the little parasites off of it or whatever. Right. And that helps both of them. I think that'd be the closest thing to having like a pet would be like one of those symbiotic relationships. But I don't think there's any in the world that we know of where they have a pet for like enjoyment or companionship, you know, in the wild at least. Yeah. Well, I got a fun episode for us today. It's a new animal. It's one that I learned a lot while we were while I was doing the research. Before I get into it, is there anything else you guys need to say or can we just can we just launch into this? I think we can. Hercules beetle? Sure, you can say that. Yeah. Was that were the animals? No, no. I'm not going to guess. I'm not going to. People are going to know because it says in the title, but I know. I'm ready to just yeah. Yeah. Anyway, the sources today, I really use mostly just one source for the story, which is from another podcast, but they're friends of ours outside magazine's podcast out alive, which I was on once with Tom Tom Smith. They did a story about this story called paralyzed by a scorpion. I really recommend you guys checking out that podcast in general. It's a really good outdoors podcast about survival situations. This episode is really good. If you want to hear the victim tell the story in her own words, I'm going to be summarizing it because I think it's one of the better scorpion stories I've found. Then we're also going to hear from our friend Ian, who has a great story from Africa involving scorpions. It's going to be a fun episode. All right. Hey, yo. Hey, yo. That's what I got to say to that. Are you guys into river rafting? Say you're really into river rafting. Just say it. Say it, right? Yeah, I feel like that's one of the only things Mike genuinely likes. I do. Yeah. Yeah. So you're really into it. I like it quite a bit. Yeah. Okay. Well, now that we've established you guys are such river rats, what's the number one place in the contiguous United States where people want to go river rafting? Like the lower 48 where like white water rafting is, it's kind of like the Holy Grail. The Grand Canyon. Bingo, Jeff. You nailed it. I'm so proud of you. The Grand Canyon, the Colorado River and the Grand Canyon. So Abigail, there's a viral video right now of like a little boy who walks up to the overlook of the Grand Canyon. Yeah. And he just turns to the camera and is like, but where's the canyon? And he's like genuine. It's all that's in the like video is the canyon. Yeah. That's really funny. Oh boy. Darwin. What? Darwin's coming for him. Yeah. Abigail Baronean grew up in Washington state and she was always into the great outdoors. Everything from skiing to hiking, fishing. But in 2022, she got more and more into river rafting. And she was actually lucky enough that year to be able to go on a float trip through the Grand Canyon, which is really lucky because there's a really long wait list to be able to float the Grand Canyon. You can't just go do it. You need permits and whatnot. So guys, what kind of dangerous critters might you find in the Grand Canyon? Serial killers. Possibly serial killers. Yeah. That's a mountain lion. Mountain lion, occasional black bear and lots of them boulder. A tumbling boulder. I don't know if I'd count them as a critter, but maybe critters from the movie critters. They decided to do the Grand Canyon. I count that. Those worms and tremors. Yeah, the tremors. Graboids. How do you think the canyon got formed in the first place? Oh, yeah. Surely Graboids dug that out. It's crazy how we're just letting Dune get away from totally copying Graboids. Oh, shy Halu dude. It could have been shy Halu to dug that out. Right. Frank Herbert. What a hack. Just stealing the sandworm idea. Just 20 years before tremors came out. All right. There's also lots of venomous stuff. So there's rattlesnakes, black wood of spiders and of course, scorpions. So well Abigail, she'd spent a lot of time outside and like a lot of people that are fairly outdoorsy, I don't think she was too worried about potential dangers of wildlife in a place like the Grand Canyon. And that's good because if you are prepared and you know what you're getting into, you don't want to let potential dangers stop you from enjoying an incredible trip like a float through the Grand Canyon. Plus there are bigger things to worry about. There's class five rapids, 115 degree weather, climate change, climate change, policy about that. You never know if you're going to get into a political discussion. Nukes, bombs, nukes. Yeah. Hopefully not her Jeff. These resolutions out the window. She actually also had a case of COVID the first week of the trip. That's another danger. Anyway, the group had made it to Whitmore Wash and it was insanely hot. So Abby and her friend, I'm going to call her Abby, her name's Abigail, but we're doing Abby for short. And her friend Grayson put some water on the hot sand and then they put their pads on top, hoping that this evaporating water would help cool down their sleeping area just a little bit. And about 1030 at night, Abigail and Grayson are on their pads, which are on top of a canvas mat. And all that Abby has is a thin sheet that's pulled over her. They're staring up at the endless stars of the desert Southwest. They're chatting slowly Grayson feels his eyes getting heavy and sleep is washing over him. But then suddenly movement on his arm jolts him back awake. And if you're lying in the middle of nowhere in the desert, camping out, you don't have a tent in the dark, and you feel something substantial crawling on your arm. What is your first reaction going to be? Snake. Not like what are you going to think? What are you actually going to do? Yeah, I'm going to swat it with my other hand. Yeah, you're going to throw that that little fetcher, you know, you're just gonna chuck it. And that's what he did. He flicker off, swipe my arm. Yeah, he flicked it off. And, you know, it flew through the air. And he even said what the fuck was that and immediately flicked it off his arm. It sailed through the air. It's in full defensive mode now, and it lands on Abby's thigh. Oh, wow. I like it being in defense mode before it even lands is just like squinting up in the middle of the air ready to go. It's flying through the air, you know, that's not that's not normal stuff for it. So it's already at a heightened. You like what? I like how Wes asked like, what are you gonna do if you feel something on your arm? And the real answer is throw it on the person sleeping next to you. That's not you're gonna flick it and you're probably not gonna think you're not necessarily going to think about where it's going to go, you know, but had I said throw it on the person sleeping next to me, I would have been correct. You would have been right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. 500 orders a month was manageable. Embrace intelligent order fulfillment with ShipStation, the only platform combining order management, warehouse workflows, inventory, returns and analytics in one place. What used to take five separate tools, ShipStation does in one, go to ShipStation.com and use code start to try ShipStation free for 60 days. But yeah, I was thinking about that when you suddenly feel something you think is a spider or something kind of scary on you, you don't really you go into panic mode and you kind of just want it off, no matter what. And I think that's what happened to Grayson. Anyway, this mystery intruder was actually much more of an intruder than they ever could have imagined. And we'll get to that. It was a species of bark scorpion that's relatively new to the Grand Canyon area. And when it hit Abby's thigh, it shot its tail forward lightning quick and stung her multiple times. Oh, all right. So bit of biology. There are about 1500 species of scorpion in the world. And about 30 of them are dangerous to humans, all of them belonging to the family but the day, but the day, but the day. And according to a medical paper I found from 2012 that's titled emerging options for the management of scorpion stings. This is crazy to me. I had no idea this was this big of a widespread problem. There are about 1.5 million invendulations by scorpions worldwide every year and about 2600 deaths. So 2600 people a year on average worldwide die from scorpions. Wow. Yeah, I thought it was like maybe one or two. Yeah, a year. Yeah. Yeah. Most of those occur in Northern Africa and Southeast Asian India. Okay. Yeah, I don't know. I feel like when I was a little kid, I thought scorpions were like the most dangerous. And then once I got older, I was like, oh, they're not dangerous. And now you're telling me, no, you were right when you were a little boy. Yeah. And especially the little kids are dangerous, actually. But no, you always hear that you hear like, oh, it's like a bee sting or whatever. But there are scorpions out there again, about 30 species that pose a real risk to humans. And according to this paper on average, there are about 1000 scorpion invendulations every year in the US and one death. It actually is much higher than that. I found a different paper that says there's much more invendulations. I don't know how many deaths on average, but I think that's about right. And the scorpions responsible for those deaths are almost always from the genus Centroides, which are the bark scorpions. How'd they end up in Arizona? We'll talk about that. So there is a speed, there's several species of bark scorpion in Arizona. And one is called the Arizona bark scorpion. And that is thought to be our most dangerous scorpion in the United States. That's the one we're kind of doing biology for. But there's a twist to the story that I don't want to spoil yet. An interesting little tidbit about scorpions. Generally speaking, the larger the pinchers, pincers, pincers, pincers, what do you guys say? Pinchers or pincers? Pincers? Pincers. Pincers. Okay. The larger the pincers on a scorpion, the less venomous it'll be. So for example, you remember in Hook, when they do the boo box? Yeah. And they put the guy in the boo box and they're dropping the big black scorpions in. Which I think is Glenclothes. Fear factor they did some big black scorpions too. Is that Glenclothes? Yeah, fear factor too. Yeah. So those are emper scorpions. They're also the ones they usually use in jackass and stuff. They have these really big black pincers. They look like a really formidable scorpion. But that's one where you're talking more about kind of like a bee sting or even less than a bee sting. Oh really? Because they have those big pincers. And the thing there is like that is a scorpion that's able to kill its prey with its pincers, but it doesn't necessarily need its venom. But the ones that have really small slender pincers, now I'm saying pincers a lot. You're nailing it. Yeah. Those ones tend to have much more potent venom. So if you're on the desert and you see a yellow scorpion with really slender ones, those little guys in claws. Claws. Yep. That's the kind you want to watch out for. Yeah. And bark scorpions do have really slender pincers. So you must love scorpions. Because they're smaller, the smaller ones are more smaller. They're smaller, they're tougher. The smaller, they're tougher. Sure. Yeah, I do love scorpions, but not because of that. But maybe now. Maybe subconsciously, that's why you like them so much. That could be true. I am the smallest of the three of us. And you're pretty tough. Thanks, Jeff. I appreciate that. Bark scorpions are generally mostly yellowish orange or light brown scorpions. They can get up to three inches long. They're found throughout the southern United States, Mexico, Central America and northern South America. But the one that's claimed the most fame in the US is the Arizona bark scorpion, which is found in the Sonoran Desert and has the most potent venom of all native US scorpions. They are arachnids, which means they have eight legs and two body segments. Oh, really? Cephalothorax and an abdomen. Yeah. So they're spiders. They're closely related to spiders. Correct. And spiders aren't insects. Not insects. Those are different. What the heck? They are all invertebrates. They're all arthropods, but they are not insects. Unlike most scorpions, it's mostly spend their time on the ground or in burrows. Bark scorpions are really good climbers. They're often found inverted on trees, branches, rocks, human material, just about anything. So this is a scorpion that you'll sometimes see on the bottom side of branches or whatever. And that's why they call them bark scorpions, is they really like to like hang out on bark upside down and they'll catch moths and whatnot that are flying by. Cool. So there could be like in the big arches down in the national parks in Utah, could there be some scorpions hanging under the bottom of those? It's not impossible. I like to think about them doing that. Yeah. So do I, Mike. I think that's more of a spider spot and they just would make a web through the whole arch. Dude, you got to think they do that a lot. That's a good idea. Or swing through it. They'd catch so much food. Yeah. It's the scariest thing. You probably ruined like a million webs swinging through that thing. They're like, no, my dream house, my life's work. That's probably the most valuable real estate for spiders now that you think about it, right? Yeah, you killed a billion or spiders probably. That's good. You should be high five. I am happy. Okay, I will. Next time I see you. They eat a wide variety of insects and invertebrates and they're eaten by a number of different reptiles, spiders, mammals, and birds. They give live birth to their young and females will carry up to 30 baby scorpions on their back until they reach their first molt, which their molt is when they shed their exoskeleton as they grow larger. Well, exoskeleton doesn't grow, but their body does. So they have to shed it as they get bigger. That's like peak scariness when they have all the babies on them, I feel like. Oh, yeah. That's creepy as a creepy picture. Yeah. So they just molt off that layer of exoskeleton or whatever it is that scorpions have. Is that the right word for it? Exoskeleton? Yeah. And then the babies are still just on that molten layer and the mom just like takes off and that's it. I don't know. No, I think it's when the babies reach their first molt that the mom stops carrying them. Oh, it's not when mom reaches her first molt. It would be like such a relief for the mom to just shed 30 babies at once and just like that. The babies are like, mom? Yeah, like, are you okay? All right. So they hibernate in the winter, often in groups, groups up to like 40 or 50 scorpions. Oh, wow. And they'll, yeah, they'll only leave their dens when temperatures in the evening are consistently in the low 70s. And we're talking about Arizona bark scorpions right now. As I mentioned earlier, their venom is potent enough to cause extreme pain, terrible symptoms, and even death in humans. We're going to dig into some stats quickly. Because honestly, this was all very surprising to me. Paper in the Journal of Medical Toxicology titled nationwide scorpion exposures reported to US poison control centers from 2005 to 2015. It's a long title. You guys should trim up your titles in the future. They looked at all the reported stings nationwide during that 11 year time period. They found 185,402 total reports of scorpion invenomations during those 11 years in the US, which is a crazy number. That's a lot, much more than that other paper reported for the US. I'm going to have you guys guess the top three states for scorpion stings. And if you get them correct and in the right order, I'm going to go outside right now and let one of Jesse's bees sting me. Do we both get to guess? You both get to guess, but I'm not going to answer. Well, one of us gets, we'll both guess and then if one of us gets it right, you got to go get stuck. Yes, I really don't want to get stuck. I'm going to go. I never wanted to be right. More than correct order and states. I'm going to go number one, California, number two, Arizona, number three, Utah. Okay, Mike, I'm going to go Texas, Arizona, New Mexico. Mike, you were the closest, but neither of you got it. It's Arizona, number one, Texas, number two, Nevada, number three. Nevada. Oh, I should have known that. I got stung by so many scorpions there. I really? No. There are a bunch though. Me and my older brother caught like tons and put them in cages all the time. It's much more common than I thought it was. So more and more I'm believing people when they say they've been stung. I had a friend in Mexico that got stung while we were camping on the beach and he woke me up in the middle of the night like, hey, what do I do? And I just, I had no idea. So I was like, draw a circle around it and we'll check in the morning to see if it's spread. And then I just went and laid in my tent and was like, oh, I hope he's okay. Because it looked like a bark scorpion. Anyway, I think my confidence helped him calm down a little bit. Love you, Kyle. All right. So in 2014 alone, according to this paper, over 16,000 cases were reported, which was far more than the total number of reports for snakes and spiders combined, which again is really shocking. And they stated that the Arizona bark scorpion was actually the leading cause of death by invenomation between 1929 and 1948. So more than snakes, more than spiders, more than anything else. Is that just for the United States? It was, yeah, just in Arizona that between 1929 and 1948, it was the leading cause of death by invenomation. Yeah. But in Arizona, not in like Africa. Yeah. In Arizona. All right. So surely Coyote Peterson has let one of these guys sting him, right? I mean, I wouldn't hold it past him. He hasn't. One of his collaborators on his channel, Brave Wilderness, did. And I will say, I watched this video. Yeah. And I was riveted the entire time that I watched it. I know we give old Coyote a hard time sometimes, but his content can be very, very fun to watch. Yeah. This guy's name is Mark Vance. He's on Brave Wilderness. And he made an Arizona bark scorpion sting him. He's very serious about never doing it yourself. So if you're thinking about forcing potentially our most dangerous and painful scorpion to sting you, just go ahead and rethink it, guys. I know you guys have that in your mind. Don't do this at home. Yeah. And if anyone out there is thinking about that, rethink it and maybe rethink a lot of things. I hope he is just like an intern with the Coyote Peterson. Like he's like, Coyote's like, you have to do something big to be on this show. All right. All right. So this guy ranked the sting on three factors, intimidation, pain, and aftermath. But I think they also should have had a category for how much you run around screaming afterward, because I think it would have been a 10 out of 10 if they had that one as well. Yeah. Anyway, he said it was way worse than a bullet ant. I took a screenshot of his face so you guys could see just how bad it hurt. I'm going to share it with you here. He took it on the face? No. Maybe he's just shouting or something. I even took a screenshot of his face. You guys can see how bad it hurts. He's got good teeth. That's a face of a man deep in the throes of some ouchies. You know? Yeah. Good grimace. Yeah. And he really was. He ended up giving it a 9.8 for intimidation, a 10 out of 10 for pain, and a 10 out of 10 for aftermath. I don't understand intimidation. Because he was really nervous to let it sting him. It was like he was so scared to do it that he felt real. I know. I know. But this is you two. Yeah. Yeah. 9.8. Yeah. I know. You could say whatever you wanted. It seems like a sophisticated scale to be measured. Yeah. You know, I'm not the one getting stung. I'll let him make the rules. I'm just saying I don't completely get that one. Yeah. It also got a 10 out of 10 for aftermath because the pain spread through his entire arm and didn't completely go away in his hand for over a week. He says it is his worst sting ever and his only sting where he considered going to the hospital. It was that bad. Yeah. Our hand was it. I can't remember. Was it like his dominant? I doubt he did. Why? I was just curious. Yeah. All right. There's some, well, you know. You might want to find a scorpion. Right. You might have some of that. So from Sydney Sweeney too. Paralyzed feeling with tingles. Call my wife. Calling UK wildlife. Voice assistance not working for you. BlackRock Investment Trust has a lot working for you. Get to know them at blackrock.com. Capital at risk. Marketing material. BlackRock Investment Management UK Limited. Authorized and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority. Let's get back to Abby. She'd just been stung multiple times on one leg by the scorpion. The pain was immediate and unlike anything she had ever experienced before. Burning, crazy pain like someone is ramming a hot iron into her leg and her salient is still a mystery. She still has no idea what's doing this to her. So she's screaming, she's writhing in her sheet, she's getting twisted up in the process, and suddenly she gets another sting on the other leg. Her brain wanted to convince her that it was just a wasp or a red ant or something, but she knew just from the pain whatever it was, it was bigger and much worse. Yeah. So Grayson runs over. That's how I felt last time I got stung by a bee. I was like, that's something worse than a bee and then it was just a bee. Just a bee sting. When you get stung by a bee, you're like, I forget how bad this hurts. And this scorpion is like 100 times worse. Yeah. So Grayson runs over with his headlamp. He starts searching through the covers, the sheets looking for whatever was stinging Abby. And as he turns his head and the light falls on the sand, both Abby and Grayson see a small scorpion scuttling away. It's pincers up in the air. Really? Yeah. So it's mad. I'd assume they do that one. It's like, yay, I got her. So she has this sinking realization that she had been stung multiple times by a scorpion, just as Grayson reaches out with the flip-flop and kills this tiny arachnid. So they call some of her friends over. One of them has a wilderness first responder certification, and he tells Abby that he had been stung by a scorpion before, that it was going to really hurt really badly, and probably do some weird stuff to her joints. She might even get a fever, but that should be all right because that was his experience. They decide to monitor her for anaphylaxis so she doesn't have an allergic reaction. But when it seemed like she was in the clear for that, they put her on a cot. They told her she was bound to feel better in the morning and that the pain would subside. But as Abby laid there in the dark, her tongue started to feel kind of weird. She thought it was strange that her tongue felt abnormal, but she'd taken an oxycontin so she thought maybe it was just the drug taking effect. Jeff, you've taken some of those probably recently. Do they make your tongue feel weird? You know what? They don't, but I wouldn't be shocked if my tongue did start to feel. I feel like it gives you dry mouth and stuff. So she thought that might be it. And that's when a crazy pins and needles sensation spread all over her body and it felt like her face, her neck, her back, her arms, and her legs had all gone to sleep and her chest was starting to get really tight. So I think from what I've understood from reading these accounts of people being stung, it's like when you lay on your arm and you fall asleep on your arm and you wake up and it's totally asleep, you know? Yeah. And then when it kind of starts to come back to life, you get that crazy pins and needles. It's like that, but times 10. Like just a terrible sensation where any kind of touch causes crazy pain. So her chest is starting to get tight. She's still trying to talk herself down. She's telling herself, this must just be what Venom feels like. I've never had a scorpion sting me before, so I don't have any reference. This is just what it feels like. Then she opened her eyes and the stars that were there just a few moments before were no longer there. And the reason for that is her eyes wouldn't track anymore. They were kind of just rolling around in her head and not focusing on anything because she had lost motor control over her eyes. So understandably, she starts freaking out a little bit, which totally, 100% the same thing would happen to me. One thing that we didn't really get into earlier was how Scorpion Venom works. Basically, it attacks the way that your body sends messages. It's a neurotoxic Venom. And specifically, it's attacking your sodium ion channels that open and close to transmit messages. So you have these sodium ion channels and say your body's like, you need to feel some pain. They will open and deliver a quick pain message to you. Or if you need to feel like pins and needles or whatever, they are controlling those messages. So what happens when you get Scorpion Venom in you is they are just kind of left open. So you are feeling like Spiderman. How so? The spider sense? No. Spidey sense? Yeah, I know what Spidey sense is. Keep saying it. But I don't think it's the same thing. If he was in constant debilitating pain and kind of like paralyzed, then I think it would be a perfect example. But I don't think that's what happened to him. So basically, this pathway that controls stuff like motor function and pain is just stuck open and signals like, hey, you should be feeling some pain or hey, maybe move your eyeballs this direction are just constantly going, which has to feel really insane. Yeah. So she's losing motor control. And she said not being able to move her eyes where she wanted them or speak or anything else was incredibly scary, like being in a dream where she wanted to scream but nothing would come out. She couldn't even scream. Even though she had a mouth. Yeah. Yeah. It's like that book. I read a story like that. Yeah. Harlan, what's his name again? Allison. Yeah. She's also feeling incredible pain, strong burning pain at her three sting sites and then weird tingling super sensitivity on the rest of her body. So finally she decides she's in real trouble. She would grace and up to try and tell him that she might need to be evacuated. And he said it sounded like she was drunk. She was slurring and couldn't really get the words out. She's not really able to communicate. So she had to like grace and and the others figure out what to do. They determined that it's the middle of the night. They wouldn't even be able to get us a helicopter in until morning. And she'd probably be feeling better by then. So they just decide we're just going to wait until morning to see how she is. So this decision. Yeah. Did you have another option? I do think that if you were like in life or death, a helicopter can come in in the night. You know, I don't think that's like a for sure no. They can fly at night. Yeah. Yeah, they can fly at night. Yeah. Abby didn't really want to be evacuated. She wanted to stay. So they also took that into into interesting. So it's made the decisions made for her. She basically has to stay up all night with very little control of her body. She's feeling like a prisoner in her own mind. Her thoughts will spiral into this panic loop and she's getting it's getting harder to breathe because of the anxiety and she's having to fight to regain composure. And actually she draws on her experience with psychedelics because she experimented a little bit with them and she'd had some bad trips. And if you're in the middle of a bad trip, what you have to tell yourself is this is going to pass. Like this is going to go away. I'm going to get back to normal. And that's essentially how she was treating the scorpion sting in her mind was saying this is just a bad trip. I'm going to feel normal again. And that really helped, which I thought was cool. Unfortunately, when morning came around, she was still having the same symptoms. And one of the people in the group who was an EMT came over and took her vitals, which all looked good. So basically her whole body is paralyzed, but her vitals are great. So it's kind of a hard decision whether or not to evacuate her. All right. So by seven, she starts seeing some small improvements. Her eyeballs stop roving as much. She could focus on faces and her speech is starting to improve. So they call some friends that worked in an eara on a sat phone. And they looked up her symptoms and they pretty much immediately said, this is not normal. You need to evacuate her. This is not what a scorpion sting should do to a person. Then they looked a little bit harder and they learned that her symptoms actually were kind of normal if she were a child, but not for an adult. Like children have this systemic reaction sometimes. So she lied about her age. Yeah. So they were like, Hey, are you actually eight? And she was like, Yeah, I needed the right opportunity to tell you guys. And finally, I am one of the senior editors at Outside Magazine and I'm an eight year old. Wow. Go get her. No, but the fact that they saw that this was at least in the realm of possibility for some human beings made them feel a little bit better. Three stings isn't like typical, right? You normally just get stung once. Yeah. I mean, I don't know if it's atypical, but generally it's just once because people get three things like a lot. Bling it off. Yeah. Three is a lot. It is. Yeah. Yeah. Are they injecting their venom similar to how snakes do? Like are they controlling how much they're loaded with the payload? I don't know what the word is for it. Load. Yeah. They do think that they have some muscular control over the amount of venom that's injected. But I think it may be, I don't know if it's quite as conscious as it is with snakes. Okay. So maybe the second and third sting might have been like a diminished amount. Or it could be. It's just kind of uncontrolled, maybe. They can deliver a dry sting, apparently. Okay. Yeah. Shooting blanks. Yeah. You know, we've all been there. Right, guys? Me? Right, guys? Sponsored by Hames. Yeah. All right. She's still in a lot of pain. Anything that touches her skin makes her cry out or burst into tears. But ultimately, she decided she didn't want to be evacuated and everyone decided that they weren't going to evacuate her against her will. So she lays down in a raft and the whole day, anytime that anything would touch her or anything, she would start crying. But over time, her motor control is kind of coming back. She's still feeling a ton of pain, but she is slowly getting some of her feeling back. I can't imagine a worse scenario to be in where any kind of disturbance will cause you pain than white water rafting to Grand Canyon. By that night, she was able to walk and her pain was subsiding. It's an important note, is that up until this point, she couldn't walk. By the next morning, she's pretty much back to normal. For a few weeks, her limbs and face would still fall asleep really quickly and her skin was really sensitive to pain. But those are really the only lasting side effects, although there was one more lasting side effect. And that was that Abby got pretty obsessed with learning about scorpions because she was so perplexed about why her symptoms had been so bad. And she managed to preserve the scorpion and some formaldehyde, the one that stung her. And she did tons of research. But an episode of Allegies, which is a great podcast, I've been on it before, Allie Ward hosts it, highly recommended, it's a science podcast. That episode pointed her in the direction of an arachnologist, someone that specializes in arachnids. This person's name was Lauren Esposito. And she agreed that Abby was probably stung by an Arizona bark scorpion. But she said her symptoms were so intense, that she really wanted to see this scorpion to make sure. So this Lauren Esposito explained that sometimes different species of bark scorpions from Mexico had made their way into the US on people. Like so if people went and visited Mexico or whatever, and brought back luggage or something, scorpions might have made their way in. And it wasn't impossible that Abby had been stung by one of these Mexican scorpions. And a few of those species actually have more potent venom than the Arizona bark scorpion. So they're still bark scorpions, but they're different species that are even more potent. Or another option could be that she was just recovering from COVID. And that's why she had such a crazy reaction. So Abby sent her some good photos of the scorpion. And Lauren Esposito is pretty sure that she was stung by one of these more dangerous bark scorpions from Mexico. And that there may even be a small population of those scorpions that now live in the US. Yeah. Okay. So. Wait, didn't you say she kept the scorpion? Yeah, she did. So can't they just figure that out? I think it's pretty figured out. I don't know if she sent it to this Lauren Esposito or not, but she sent really good photos of it. I think they're so similar though, like our bark scorpions and Mexican bark scorpions, that even if you, I think you would probably have to run like a DNA test on it. And maybe that was just like too much money and effort to solve this mystery. I don't know. Okay. Yeah. Under what a 23 in me a test would look like for a scorpion. They traced it back to like its dinosaur ancestors. Tiny bit of its venom in that little tube. Right. I wonder if the pictures were so nice, it makes me think she went to a professional and kind of had it posed, you know, with like the hands under the chin or dancers, like warm lighting. Yeah, I like that. Like the faded out picture of it in the background behind it. Oh, I like that. That sounds great. Let's have Braxton make one of those of a scorpion for us. I will. All right. So that's our first story. Our second story is actually going to be a little quicker, but it's from a friend of mine. I really wanted to tell it on this scorpion episode. Mike, get the hell out of here. We don't want you in this interview. All right. He's gone. He's running away. He yeah, took that very literally. Okay. So that's our first story. And for our second one, I wanted to have our friend Ian. How do you say your last name Ian, by the way? Breeland. Breeland. Cool. Ian. Kind of rhymes. Yeah, it does kind of. It's a good name. Good job, Ian's parents. So we wanted to have Ian on to tell a quick story of his experience because I know Ian was stung by a scorpion in Africa. Just a quick intro for Ian. Ian is a reptile expert. Would you feel comfortable calling yourself a reptile expert? Yeah, yeah, we can say proficient reptile enthusiasts. Okay. I would ask you reptile questions. That's what Wes says when I say I'm a bear expert. Ian spends, I mean, you're out there every day herping, taking people on tours, you know, guided herping adventures. And I think when we hear about tours, we often think of these more canned things, but your adventures are very much like you were in chest deep water, searching for anacondas kind of stuff, much more intense. But yeah, a conservationist, science educator, someone that I've followed for a long time on Instagram because you have really incredible content. So we wanted to have you on to tell your story. Great. Thanks guys. I'm excited. Yeah. Yeah. And a quick tidbit too. Ian is going to be leading our Komodo trip in January. So we're really excited for that because I have a quick question. So if you were just to get bit like randomly by a scorpion in any continent, is Africa like the last one you'd want to get stung? Not bit stung? Yeah, yeah, actually, I would say absolutely. Africa, most invertebrates and vertebrates, I think those are like the final bosses in Africa. Yeah. Well, we talked about this earlier, but there's like a number of deaths every year from scorpions. I got a much higher amount than I ever would have thought. And Northern Africa is responsible for the most out of out of any, you know, section of the world, Northern Africa has the most deadly scorpion stings. I know yours was in Southern Africa. So I just love, we would love to hear your story, hear a little bit about what happened, how it felt. Yeah. Yeah. So I will preface it with, I've never really thought too much about scorpion stings. You know, they're always present. They kind of go hand in hand with snakes and a lot of ecosystems. So we see a lot of scorpions. We interact with a lot of them. We get them in our shoes. You know, it's pretty standard procedure to shake your shoes out anywhere that we are. And it's kind of a part of everyday life, but I had never given them that much thought as far as the danger, the potential danger until this experience. So do you guys kind of want just like a play by play? Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So we have to take it back to November 2024. And Zimbabwe, we were running our fourth annual herping expedition there, which is my personal favorite. It's just Africa is another beast. You know, you're always looking over your shoulder. You truly are down in the food chain. We always have someone like with a huge rifle that hopefully will absolutely never have to use it. But that's the only place that we even come remotely close to having to have like security for animals. It's not for people. And that's what you're thinking of the whole time is the big stuff. So we had just had an amazing night. We found a rock python, the Southern African rock python, the biggest we've seen yet, which was like three feet, but they can get huge. They're like, they can get 20 plus feet and they're incredible. So I was really excited over the moon. They love eating kids in Canada too, those rock pythons. Yeah, that was news for me. That's crazy. And I believe that after seeing them in the wild, they are just, there's something about them, something that just keeps them kind of eternally mad. And it might just be all the big megafauna there. But yeah, so I was to say the least over the moon, and that might have led to a little bit of, you know, a little bit of euphoria taking over my logic. And I was barefoot. It was maybe one a.m. Barefoot. I had just mixed, which is important to the story a little later. I just mixed a gin and juice to celebrate this python. And I was going to sip it while photographing it. And we had a couple other cool snakes. And it's pretty, it's pretty standard there. If we find something really cool, we're okay with keeping it just for a couple hours to photograph. And then we take it right back where we found it. And we have a lot of people that like doing macro photography. And we like set up kind of little, little studios under the lodge. So there's a common living space. And that's where everyone kind of hangs out, you know, they check their phones, look at their pictures, they read. And it's open air. There's, you can put your shoes at the entrance, and you're actually not allowed to wear shoes in there. So we're always barefoot. And you just don't, it feels safe because you're under a roof. But you don't really think about things coming in. And I sat up to take my cup of my drink and walk over to this table. This first step right when I stand up, I just felt, and I was kind of had my heel under this couch that I'd been sitting on. And I just feel this shooting electrifying, like it felt like a shotgun just blew my foot off, honestly. And I couldn't, I thought absolutely the first thing that came through my head is there was a puff out under the couch. And I just got nailed. That's how painful it was. I never, ever would have pinned a scorpion for being that on, on contact, painful. Not like, not like a bull an ant where it comes up and it lasts for hours on end. It was just immediate. And I just instinctively flung at Yeld. And I flung my, my ankle kind of trying to get whatever it was off me, half expecting like a big fat viper to be hanging on my heel. And there was just a little, a little kind of blonde looking guy that flew off. Yeah, yeah, like maybe like two inches. I actually have some really nice macro photos. I ended up keeping it in a glass. And I sent this over to you guys, but it flung against the wall and kind of smacks it and like falls down. And I was like, Oh my God, it's scorpion. But it didn't really dawn on me that it could be something bad yet. And I just was like, Well, the first thing is pretty basic knowledge, I think to most people that aren't even wildlife people, you just walk up and, you know, scorpions with the big tails tend to be just in theory more venomous. And then with smaller pinchers as well. And I look and this thing is just textbook like tiny, the world's tiniest pinchers, the world's fattest tail. And I just thought at that moment, I'm in for a pretty wild ride. So I immediately took a picture. I'm like shaking. I have all this adrenaline and I'm like, my anxiety is going through the roof. I'm shaking, taking a picture. No one else knew, by the way, besides like two clients that were in the, in their room already photographing. They still, they were preoccupied with conversation. Everyone else was either asleep or showering or doing their, their, their late night thing. And they had no idea. So I take a picture and I'm like, okay, I need to send this. I knew exactly who to send it to. And it's one of them in Africa, but that was like, you know, some, some normal hours in the US. I sent it to my friend, Matthew Nautrasaki, who's like, invertebrate expert. He's like, I am a snakes, but that guy is even crazier with invertebrates. He's my go to for identifying any weird stuff we find in the field that's invertebrate. And I send it to him, not expecting a quick response. He gets a lot of identification texts like every day. And thank God, within like five minutes, I get a response. But no, it's probably within 30 seconds, honestly, because this is all, this is all happening. I'm describing it at like the most broken down speed because the entire encounter happened within probably 35 minutes from start to finish. But he responds and he just said, he just said, uh, I hope you're joking. That's not the good text to get it. Worst. Is there even a worst response? Oh man. So, so from there, I immediately I'm like, no, I'm not joking. I'm not pulling your leg. I just got stung by this. What is it? And, and now I'm thinking the only scorpion that I'm two scorpions I'm aware of at that point in Africa is the death stalker, which I think is probably what name. Yeah. Yeah. It doesn't sound like, or I'd want to be stung by. And I knew that one had a fat tail. I knew that it looked pretty similar, but I didn't really know. I never looked up pictures of them. I just heard of them. I think that's the northern Africa one. Yeah. Okay. And I think there's like a few different species of death stalker that go down. And I know there is one in Zababwe, but I didn't know what it looked like. I didn't know anything. I just knew there was one in the area. And so then I knew about the flat rock scorpion, which is like totally harmless. It has like a tiny little stinger. It doesn't even know how to use anymore. And so he asked, okay, if you really got stung, you need to send me a top down picture. You need to send the pedipalps. You need to send like the hairs on them. You need to send a face, a side profile. And I'm like this at this moment, the this is maybe for, let's say 45 seconds to a minute in. And I'm just feeling like I've been trying to find a good descriptor for the last few months for it. It was like, if you took a, I think it was like, if you take like a a TIG, whatever those welding machines are, like the home ones, and you just started like welding straight through my heel and like pulling it up it through my calf. But very slow at like tortoise speeds, but you can still feel it moving. But the weird thing, and the weird thing that really still stands out to me is that it was a border of pain. It was a wall of pain, but below that wall, once it had passed an area, that area was no longer in pain, but it was completely paralyzed. Nothing worked, which I've never felt. I was bit by a Fertilance in Costa Rica 2017, which is a pit viper. Nothing even close to this, just ethereal. It was like a psychedelic almost feeling. And, but it was physical. And so it's going up my, my, all of my foot. And then it was into my calf within about two minutes. And the calf started seizing. So I could feel and see the calf. I should have recorded it, but it would have just been like shaky car crash footage. But it was like, uh, doing like this. And then it just went to for audio listeners. He's like opening and closing his hands. Having boobs. Yeah. And it just, I wish that's what was happening. It was, um, it was, uh, it was pulsating, pulsating and, um, that that kind of cramping, do you think? Yeah. Yeah. Cramping for sure. It was like, it was like a, when you hit a, like a cockroach and it's like dying. And it was like, that was my muscles kind of. Yeah. And, um, I, so at that point I'm looking up, I'm like speed educating myself on all of the scorpions that are possible. Um, and Matthew had come back and said, he's like, it could be a death stalker, but I need to look at it closer. And, um, then he comes back and he gives me like two that are not as bad as death stalkers. And one was the Eastern gnome at the hot and taut of trial in Yatta. And the other one was some, some other one that was worse. And this one had an anti-venom. The hot and taut, I believe did not have an anti-venom. So it was basically a determination. Like, do I need to get to the hospital? Like ASAP, um, to get this anti-venom or is there no point because there is no anti-venom? So at that point I'm like, I should go wake up my girlfriend who's asleep. She, uh, had just gone into our huts, which is like, maybe 50 feet outside of the living area. There's like a little, a little trail and it leads to our hut. And I was like, okay, I gotta like hop over there. Were you afraid of scorpions when you're walking over there? Yeah, yeah. This time I would, I would just have like that in my mind, like, there's going to be scorpions this whole walk back over. Oh yeah. Yeah. And there are, dude. I can't even describe how many scorpions are there. And we're there. We try to aim our trips right when rainy season hits. So that's when like everything that is kind of creepy crawly starts being active, surface active. So there's a lot. We already seen probably, on average, we probably seen 10 to 20 scorpions a night hiking. So they're all over. So I was like looking and I'm like dragging my foot at this point. Um, just the pain was like shocking, electrifying. I've been talking about a lot of things and it just, I, there's nothing that comes close. It felt like it also, it was so painful in one area, the one area that was moving up my leg, that it was sending like shock waves throughout my body of pain where I almost couldn't control like my own body. And I think that's where I started to understand people that like almost like seas from pain. Yeah. Because it felt like I wanted, I wanted to just drop on the ground and, and like roll around like a little twinkie. Yeah, like Coyote Peterson. Uh, no, I actually, so on his channel, one of his like, kind of underlings got stung by a Neurozona bark scorpion, which from what I understand, a lot of these scorpions have very similar acting venom. And he said it was by far the worst pain he's felt from any sting, any animal. So that was a big surprise for me in learning more about scorpions is how painful the stings actually are. Yeah. Yeah. And I was, I was actually, this wasn't the first scorpion sting. I was stung by a, it was called like a Western bark or something. It's not a bad bark. Uh, it's not the crazy ones, but I was stung by like the most common scorpion in Colorado, whatever that is, years ago. And that was until this one, that was the most painful sting I'd had, but it was only on my finger and it only affected my finger. And it was, but my finger felt like he was being dipped in ice water for like, like 48 hours. And then it just dissipated. Yeah. So I crawled in my kind of not crawl, I like hobble to my, my girlfriend's hut. And I kind of gently like wake her up and I was like, I really don't want to freak her out because I wasn't freaked. I wasn't too freaked out, but I was, I was definitely fearing that like, if it was worst case scenario, then something could happen. So she needs to know. And I've texted my mom at this point, which never happens. Like no news is good news on our trips for my family. And I texted her like she had called me, my dad's calling me, my sister's, they're thinking already, I tried to underplay it. But just the fact that I simply texted them about an incident was enough to spark like a full emergency response. So I'm waking, I'm waking her up. I'm like, Hey, babe, I just, I just, you know, you know, I got tagged by like, not the best scorpion against Dongwei, but we don't really know yet. And it was like, you know, you can go back to sleep if you want. But just so you know, that's what's happening. And I'm going to try to get back. But within those five minutes, like I've never had a venom work this fast, at least like it's through such a wide range of my body. Within those five minutes of waking her up and hobbling to the hut, which I think made it even worse, all that movement. And my heart is really beating. And I was starting to get kind of sweaty. I'd like, it was something that like, I felt like I felt like I could pass out at any moment, but it wasn't systemic. I think it was more anxiety. Yeah. It's hard, it's hard to differentiate between the two, you know, and down to the wire and you're in that moment. It's really hard to tell. Like even a car crash, it's hard to tell. Like, did I break my arm? Or am I just like thinking that I just almost died because I did. So it's very considerate to give her the option to go back to sleep. Yeah. It's like, I might die, but like, I don't want to keep you up. Yeah. You know, that's what I thought too. But she actually got mad at me because she's like, how could you think that I would want to go back to sleep after you got stung by a scorpion? You think I'm not terrible of a person. That's fake too. So she of course hops right out of bed. And at that moment though, within those five minutes, I actually found that I couldn't walk back to the hut. I was more, my entire leg up to my groin was completely out of action. And I tried, like even pain aside, I would just, because there is no pain under that wave that almost like a band of pain. It's just feeling less. Like I could punch my leg and I didn't feel it. So because of that, it was a noodle and I couldn't walk. I could like limp barely. So she takes me kind of like firefighter carrying me over to the hut. And by the time we get there, she lays me down, we start elevating my leg. We had no idea what to do. But we did at this point, maybe seven minutes and we finally got like a hundred percent ID from Matthew. He's like, this is definitely Eastern Nomad. Where's the scorpion? The scorpion, I had just taken a little cup of glass and I put it over it on the ground. So it was, and it was surprisingly, it was fine. I flung it into the wall at like full speed, but it was okay. They're tough yet. So he said, he said, definitely in Eastern Nomad. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. He was like, I can give you, you know, 99.9% that's Eastern Nomad. So I had never heard of it. And I didn't know what that really meant. So I asked, I kept trying to ask what it meant. And he was just like, I was like, tell it to me straight. Do I need to go to the hospital? This is really poorly managed hospital in Victoria Falls that really isn't probably going to have much to offer. Or should I try to write it out? Like not like clinician to like patient, but like friend to friend that has both experienced a lot, like in the field, like, what would you do? And he, so he tells me, he sends me a voice note. He's like, listen, I would, I would elevate the leg, I would lay down. He's like, we don't know if that helps, but it doesn't hurt. And monitor your heart rate, monitor your blood pressure, your breathing, your respiratory rate. And if you feel anything systemic beyond clammy and sweaty, then then rush to the hospital. So that would be like reduced breathing, tightness in your chest kind of stuff. Yeah, droopy eyes, discoloration in my like meekest membranes, you know, stuff like that. And yeah, probably the highest, the biggest one would be like shallow breathing or something. So we were monitoring it turned out I did have like pretty immediately once I was laying down and I didn't feel anxious anymore. So I'm pretty sure it was the venom at that point. I had tachycardia, really rapid heart rate. And nothing beyond that though. It was just that my leg was paralyzed. I felt but I was worried at this point because it's like the pain has now reached past the groin. And you know, just basic anatomy, like now it's flushed into my whole body. And I don't know much about venom, maybe more than your average person. But I figure once it reaches past your leg, like it's going into the meat of the body, the important stuff. So like one good thing could be that it's getting diluted in your body. But the bad thing could be like now it's going into your heart, you know, your organs, your what it what may have you. And so, so I lay down, they're all urging me to go to the hospital. We woke up the truck driver. And it was about an hour drive to the hospital. That's the other thing. It's a solid hour if you're booking it. And there's like dirt roads, you know, you'd be bouncing around. And it's, I mean, a hospital is a stretch, it's more of a clinic. They don't even have antivenom for any of the snakes that we are there looking for. And we always call ahead and check. So it's very poorly managed, which, you know, is just due to a lack of resources out there. It's really sad that I wish someone could do something about that. Because that's a that's a consistent pattern throughout all of Africa. So yeah, so I'm laying down. I start feeling not so much worse. I actually started feeling better at about 15 to 20 minute mark. And that's what Matthew had said. He's like, the venom works pretty quick. Probably one of the quickest, I think, for non-toxic venom. So he he said to really, like, if you manage to be okay for like 30 to 40 minutes, you're probably just writing it out and you're gonna be fine. So I'm laying down. I'm starting to feel a little better. And this guy comes up the truck driver. And he tells me, you know, for people out there, like for me, this was like a crazy experience. That was probably hopefully once in a lifetime. For people living out there, you know, most people know someone that's been stung by a pretty gnarly scorpion. So yeah, so he's telling me like, like, in fact, our gardener, I came to find out there. They're like nephew had died from a scorpion. But a lot of they have all these home remedies that really apparently work wonders, you know, which I'm very skeptical of because for snakes, a lot of the time is like witchcraft. And they're talking about all kinds of things that aren't medically. Yeah, we met with a witch doctor in Zimbabwe that said he could cure a black mamba bite. I was like, right. Yeah. Yeah, you know, I mean, so I was skeptical but but what he said, he said, there's nothing you can really do, which actually was, I think, spot on. But he said the one thing you don't do not want to do, they'll make it very much worse is drinking juice or drinking alcohol. He's like, just drink water. Meanwhile, you've got a gin and juice, which I hadn't touched yet. So I'm laying down and I'm like, okay, fine. I guess not. And at this point, we're kind of laughing. We're like, you know, I'm sweating buckets. My heart rate is crazy. And I'm like, I'm kind of almost euphoric because of it. I'm like, that's a crazy, I'm like, this was crazy. This was wild. This was insane. And we're all like cracking jokes about it. And like, I got to try that. Yeah, it's kind of like, it's kind of just like an African like bush drug in a way. And then I made the mistake of thinking it's where the 30 minute mark. And I still can't feel my leg, but the pain is gone. So I made the mistake of thinking like, okay, well, we're probably fine. It's going to come back in a little while, you know, it was enough, it was gnarly venom at that point, I'm already impressed, like, incredibly impressed by this sting. But I'm thinking I'm through it. So I sat up. And at this point, people are kind of like talking amongst themselves. They're not so much like, fuck, I mean, making sure I'm not like, nothing is getting worse. And that's when I set up. And I start texting people, start texting my mom, I'm like, I think I'm okay, I'm fine. I think I text Matthew, I'm like, dude, that's so crazy. I'm gonna learn more about scorpions now. And then I take my gin and juice. I'm like, I'm like, here's guys, that was wild. And then I took the gin and juice. And then I laid and we all are like, yeah, and then I lay back down and like, 30 seconds later, I'm DMing someone in my hands, like the first the screen stopped working on my on my phone. And then everything started to get blurry on the screen. Like I couldn't read anything. But I thought that it was, I thought that it was because the my phone was wet, and it was just causing some glitch. But then I'm like, why is my phone wet? So I look at and it's dark, it's very dimly lit. So it's not so easy to like see everything. And then I look at my thumbs and I literally, I've never seen anything like it. There was like droplets of water coming off my thumbs, like it was I was sweating so profusely off my hands that it was just pouring sweat, like it was an active drip of sweat. Really? And right when I saw that, I think it just freaked me out so badly. I was like, Oh my God, I'm not through it. This is the end. And and that and so then I sit up and I'm like, guys, I'm like, I'm not feeling okay. And then I start getting dizzy. I got like vertigo. And then last thing I saw, I just everything went black, like a whole like the end of of like bugs bunny style. Yeah. And then I was out and passed out fell back on the on the chair. And I came to maybe 30 seconds later, pretty quick. And everyone's around me, they're like, Oh my God, they're like calling the truck driver. They're like, we're gonna carry him like this is this is it just like got real. You know, he's probably like getting his respiratory is his cardiac like issues like something's happening. And then and I came to but there was a there there was a feeling at that moment, of course, that had all gone down and I'm terrified. But at that moment, it felt almost like, like there was a wave of I just kind of like, body did and now it's over. So everyone is calling for the hospital now. They're like, this is systemic. You had just like pretty much every bad symptom except for like respiratory paralysis. So we got to go like, you got a bad vision, you blacked out, you're profusely sweating, your blood pressure just freaking dropped like to the bottom of the barrel. And then I was I was like, I was like, but I woke up and now I feel okay. We also called the hospital they didn't have any ventilators. And if I was paralyzed, that's something that would keep me alive. So at that point, I'm like, guys, if it happens one more time, I will no questions asked, I'll go to the hospital. But it didn't happen one more time. Long story short, we stay up another hour, my girlfriend monitored me. And I ended up going back to bed at around 3am. And couldn't sleep too much. The pain came back once my leg started getting feeling again. But I couldn't sleep for a while. But then once I fell asleep, I woke up the next morning, like 9am, like a spring chicken. It's crazy. That is crazy. Huh. Yeah, that's wild. The sweating like having sweat pouring out of your fingertips has to be such a wild, like sensation and thing to see. I can't describe it like anything. I can't really think of, I mean, I don't know, maybe like, maybe crack does that. Well, that's great. I'm glad you had someone on call to let you know, like what kind of scorpion it is, not that it really ended up mattering a lot because you weren't close to anti-venom or anything. Yeah, insane. It, this episode, like learning more about scorpions has made me realize that they're not to be trifled with. I kind of always thought it was like a wasp sting or something. And you kind of just shrug them off. And I know there's plenty of species that are like that. But the bad ones are really bad. And I think your story, when I saw that, I was like following along as it was happening to you. And I remember thinking like, Oh, shit, this is, this is actually serious. Like, he got a real sting. Yeah, it was no joke. I will say the big thing that came out of this for me was a totally newfound interest in scorpions. I love them. I started, now I've learned like almost every species in Zimbabwe and the families, the different branches they took in evolution, like the niches they now fill is so cool. There's actually a scorpion in it that sports, that can like spray venom defensively. That's cool. Yeah. What do they squirt it out of? Oh, they're stinger. They just pressure their stinger. There's like a burrowing scorpion and they can like squirt it only like like two feet. But it's crazy. It's really cool. Wait, so the place you were staying, like made you walk around barefoot? In the living area, yeah. But, um, and you know, we thought it seems like maybe something to like reconsider. Yeah, I agree. To be fair, I think you could have worn slippers or something, but I just need to buy like some bunny slippers for Africa. Yeah. Yeah. Well, Ian, we really appreciate it. If anyone wants to check out Ian, his at on Instagram is life.of.ian. And like I said, I've been following Ian for a long time because you have incredible stories, incredible photos, incredible adventures. So, um, yeah. And then your company is called Serpentine and you do herping trips. For people who don't know what herping is. It's looking for reptiles and amphibians, but you also obviously are looking for anything else that you see out there. You're a naturalist. Yeah. Anything else you want to say before, before we move on? Uh, thanks for having me guys. And yeah, it's really great to relive that fun trauma. Thanks for reliving it with us. Yeah. Excited for Komodo. Yep. Yes. Komodo. So excited. It's my top dream of, I mean, it's everything I'm looking forward to right now. So excited. We're expecting you to get like stung a bit by something. Yeah, we need more contact. All right. All right. See you in. Thanks, Ian. Thanks guys. Bye-bye. Bye. All right. Okay. Great. Mike, what do you think of that interview? Holy cow. How's he still alive? Thank you, Ian, for telling your story. Crazy. It wasn't a scorpion, huh, Mike? Yeah. That's, that was the craziest part to me. It was actually a shark. Mike didn't hear it. It's funny. The funny thing is Mike will actually probably never hear that because he doesn't even edit our episodes anymore. Sorry, Ian. Not interested. He's our Mike guy. Do you guys have any questions about scorpions before we get into our categories? I do about invanimation. So you were saying they're monitoring for early signs of anaphylactic shock. What are those signs you're going to be looking for? Exactly. Swelling of the like throat or like your, um, why can't I think of what, your airways? So like any, it'd be the same kind of symptoms you'd see in any like strong allergic reaction. Like quick swelling and labored breathing, puffiness, redness. Yeah. Like anaphylactic shock kind of stuff. So I don't want to, I don't want to say anymore because I'm not sure exactly. But I think they were mostly specific to it. Yeah. I think they're mostly just probably monitoring how she was able to breathe. Cool. Do people, do people still die from scorpions in the United States? Yeah. So this paper, the first paper that I referenced said that on average, one person a year dies. Um, the second paper that I referenced said in that 11 year period, they thought they found seven deaths in the U S. So which would be a little less than one per year. But yes, people do die. It's often children though. Children. COVID. It could be children COVID or just dumb children, you know, Jeff said he had a story about one of those. I did. I'm just kidding. Yeah. Couldn't even identify that he was looking right at the canyon. He's looking at it. It's true. That's a story. No, the thing that's interesting and Ian talked about this a little bit is that there's a difference between having a localized reaction. So you have like pain that's localized to the state, the, the sting site and, um, like some tingling or numbness or paralysis or whatever right there and a systemic reaction, which is one that actually is starting to affect your whole nervous system. So Abby had a systemic reaction because she was losing motor control. She was like these different things were happening to her whole nervous system and children often have systemic reactions, which can lead to like cardiac arrest or a pulmonary edema or something like that, that that actually kills him, you know, but there's too many. So it doesn't matter. I'm just kidding. It's terrible. I don't blame the scorpion either. Yeah. Yeah. Because I think he was trying to sting the guy who probably was a bit bigger and wouldn't have been as much like a kid, you know? Yeah. That's, but then the guy flipped it onto the girl. So scorpion probably still thought it was stinging that guy. Yeah. So it's like, fine, I guess I'll sting her instead. Yeah. Good luck. Yeah. Maybe it's swung both ways. I like that about scorpions, I think. Doesn't care if you're male or female. No. Happy Pride Month. Yeah. To squ, shout out scorpions. Shout out scorpions. I'm glad you brought that up though. Happy Pride Month to all of our listeners. We here at Tooth and Claw, we love all of our listeners regardless, sexual orientation, gender orientation, whatever. You're all welcome here this year podcast. We love you all. Party on. Yeah. As bees, jeez, tees, we want y'all. We love y'all. Yeah. All right. Let's get to our categories. Scorpions. S's. S's. All right. Our categories today are split into two. So we're going to have a special set of categories that I'm excited about. But first we're going to do some classics. First one is your favorite scorpion from pop culture. I can go last because I have a bunch and I feel like one of them everyone has. Okay. I'll go then. Yeah. I'm thinking we should go first. That's not true, but I do think about that because we got a review about that once. Lately I've been really, yeah, I don't actually. After I said I'd go last. Everyone write us a nice review. Yeah. So I picked Clash of the Titans, both the original one from the early 80s and the redone one in like 2010 or whatever with Sam Worthington. There's a great scorpion scene in that movie. The original one is kind of hokey, but really fun. And actually I really liked the redone movie is like pretty cheesy and not a great movie, but I really liked the scorpion scene in it. And I remember the trailer had a used song over the scorpion part and it like matched up really well. So and I too have an honorable mention, but I'll wait until Jeff's done to see if anyone's used it. I'm going to go with it's a little folk story called the scorpion and the frog. You guys familiar with this one where the frog swims the scorpion across the river and the scorpion's like, I promise I'm not going to sting you if you help me get across the river and then it stings the frog like in the deepest part of the river and they're both going to die and the frogs just like, are you fucking serious dude? And the scorpion's just like, you know, it's a scorpion. Yeah, that's what we do. It's the re-scorpion sting. You should have known. It's like, I don't know, I just, I respect that. Is the message like don't help anyone? That's what I took from it. The message is like what I took from it when, because that was like a church thing that we'd hear sometimes too, but I think it was like the Rattlesnake. The American kid with the Rattlesnake and it was like a Rattlesnake. It's a Rattlesnake. It's too cold. Yeah, the whole thing that they used in church was like a sin as a sin. Oh really? I don't know. I'm not sure I ever heard that. Picked up the sin because it was gonna sting you. It was gonna get you no matter what. I don't know. I personally don't love the moral behind it though. Yeah, it's like maybe we should also trust people. Trust your sins is what it says. You hear it here first. Lean into them. All right, well, I mean, I feel like I have to just say scorpion from Mortal Kombat. Yeah. I didn't even think of that. That's a great pick. So he's so cool in the first get over it. Like get over here and then he gets you to come over there. Get over there. That's my favorite. That's my favorite scorpion. Yeah, I thought you'd take it. And then in like the video game, he was the coolest character. I mean, now I like Sub-Zero just because I'm a little obsessed with ice powers. He's been my favorite. But I still think scorpion might be cooler. He was cool for sure. The newest movie they did too. The one from Sub-Zero is way cooler than that. No. Scorpion's played by that one guy. Mike, who's that guy? I always forget his name, but he's cooler. He's in Shogun too. Sounds not us. Yeah. He's so cool. But also Sub-Zero's played by that other guy. So yeah, he's the good boy that other guy plays him. I also wanted to shout out the Ryan Goslin's jacket in the movie Drive. Oh, yeah. I thought of that. It's a great Scorpion jacket. Yeah. Another shout out I had was Honey I Shrunk the Kids when they fight that big old scorpion. Oh, really? Yeah. Dwayne The Rock Johnson. That's where the Scorpion King first showed up, I think. Oh, yeah. Scorpion King. Dwayne. That was the first movie I ever saw him in, even though he's mostly CG the whole time. What if the Scorpion King was just like teased first in Honey I Shrunk the Kids? That was actually where his story started. Yeah. That'd be great. That would be great. Yeah. Sure. Okay, so our next one we're going to do is what would Mike and Jeff do? I'm going to let you guys decide where you're going to pick that for this story. I mean, I don't want to get helicoptered out. I want to be able to draft the Grand Canyon, but that's a Duff. Jeff, what are you doing? Well, if I'm the guy, I'm definitely still flicking it on her because that's funny. It is a good prank. Are you sticking around? Yeah, I don't know what I don't know what else you could do different. Okay, Mike, do you have an answer? I don't know. It seems like no one really knew what it was until it was too late, but if I know something's on me and stinging me, I'm doing the roll move instead of the flick move. So you're just rolling around? Yeah, I like that. Okay. From what I understand, what you should do with scorpion stings is pretty similar to any kind of envenomation is you should monitor again for an allergic reaction and then you should just get to help as quickly as possible. If you are stung by a scorpion that you suspect, especially being an Arizona bark scorpion, you should probably get it checked out. But what if you're in the bottom of the Grand Canyon? Then I think if you don't feel like going to the hospital, you should wait until you start to see symptomatic or systemic symptoms. So if you start losing motor control or if you start having symptoms like that, you probably should get to help. Like Abby made it out and I'm, you know, luckily if she didn't have anything crazier happen, she could have had a heart attack or she could have like lost breathing and that could happen really quickly. So you should try and get to help if you think that you might be having a systemic reaction. There is anti-venom. There is anti-venom for a lot of different scorpion venoms, so you can potentially get some venom treatment too. So again, there's not much you can do. Like the smart thing would be to helicopter out. Yeah, stay calm. And the smart thing if you're having a systemic reaction, I wouldn't helicopter out if I just got stuck by a scorpion. But if I started losing motor control, I would really think about it hard. So the next category we're going to do, since this is a new animal, we're going to do cage match. So yeah, I think most of our animals kill the scorpion. I think that there are some that it probably would really hurt, especially the primates, like our chimps and stuff. I have something I've learned about venom is that there are certain animals whose venom only like works on certain types of other animals. So I'm guessing this wouldn't do much to our reptiles. I think most of our reptiles could eat the scorpion without having any kind of effect on their body. But I think our mammals- Don't they like kill lizards and stuff now? I don't know. Probably. I think they mostly just eat insects. I don't know them. But I know they're eaten by a lot of reptiles. So I'm guessing they don't have a lot of effect. But I think mammals do feel a strong effect from their venom. So I think there are a number of our animals that a scorpion could potentially kill, but it would also die. So I don't think it's winning against many besides maybe some of our spiders. Yeah, the funnel web. Yeah, the funnel web. I wonder what an Uruk-Kanji jellyfish in a scorpion fight would look like. That's an interesting match. Scorpion probably wins. Who knows. Our cage match is getting tricky. I don't know. Okay. All right. So our next categories are the ones I'm excited for. We here at Tooth and Claw, we really love partnering with Element because today's episode is focused on a desert animal. We thought it would be a really good opportunity to talk about some element related categories because Element is all about proper hydration. And if you're in the desert, you really want to be properly hydrated. So thought it would be a fun way to do a little bit more of a deep dive into our relationship with Element. So we've learned a lot about how their mixture of electrolytes helps you hydrate properly, replace both the salts and the water. So in honor of staying properly hydrated, I want to hear a story from each of you about a time when you felt super dehydrated. And Mike, I know that new stellar blade game just came out, so you're probably pretty dehydrated right now. I thirst profoundly. No, but a time in your life where you got super dehydrated. Oh man, this was the easiest story. I got pretty badly dehydrated to the point of being ill when I was in high school. There was a youth summer soccer camp being held just on our fields behind the school. And I had to dress up in our little, our mascot was the devil. It was like a baby devil that wore a diaper. Nice. The hottest costume and immediately upon putting it on, my sweat just exploded from every pore in my body. It was like immediately dehydrated. Those costumes are hot. I didn't for it. Color run. And I was Easter Bunny and it was hot. Yeah, we have the best picture of Jeff running in front of like 200 people in an Easter Bunny costume. We'll have to put that on the post for this episode. But I went behind the shack and had to like take the head off and lay down like every 10 minutes because I just was so disoriented and thirsty. There's an element. What a hit, dude. I know. It really would have. Jeff, what's yours? Just with someone with like pretty severe ADHD. I'm very bad at remembering the basics, like drinking and eating. So my first time ever at Death Valley, I just didn't have water and went out in Death Valley. I know. It's like the hottest. It's like 125 degrees or something. Yeah. And we saw some sand dunes and like walked pretty far out on them until I felt like super thirsty. But then it's like you have to walk all the way back still. And that's when I was like, oh, I probably have gone far enough. And I got really, I know like that happens a ton out there too. Yeah. And then I got back to the car and still didn't have water. I had to like drive to a store somewhere. Oh, geez. I love you going in to a place titled Death Valley with no water. Could have been titled Dehydration Canyon or something. Yeah. Could use some element. Me and Jeff have done a lot of backpacking with my dad. And he is classic. He'll just say, there's for sure going to be water along our hike. So often we've only brought like purifiers, thinking for sure we're going to cross these little streams and be able to fill our water bottles like delicious Montana like glacier water. Yeah. And he's especially for me in my experience has been really bad about it in this mountain range nearest called the mission mountain range. So I was on, I don't know, probably like a 15 mile hike with him once. And I brought a full bottle of water, but drank it all in the first five miles of the hike thinking, Oh, my dad told me we're going to cross all these wonderful streams. And we did not hit water until we got to the lake we were hiking to. And I was so dehyde. It was like 90 degrees, really exposed hike. And I would have killed for water. I was so thirsty to the point where like, I was starting to hallucinate water sources. So I know Jeff's been super dehydrated with him before too. It's I remember one time we like crossed a stream and we were all pretty much out of water. But the stream was like out of the lake. So it was like, Oh, we don't want lake water. That's like, you go until we get like some ice water and I don't want to do anymore. I always bring extra water and I take it from whatever sources he's a camel. He is. Yeah. Um, all right, so literally not. Yeah, he's not actually a camel, but we do love him. Our next category is what element flavor would you say best represents each other's personality? So is that suggesting you would only love him as a camp? You think people think you would only love him if he is a camel? When you said we do love him still? It's kind of because I said he's not a camel, but we do love him. Yeah. Yeah, that's a good point. I think I'd love him less if he was a camel. So I don't know why I said it like that, but I'm glad you picked that out. Yeah. Sorry. I just want to make sure. What if he was like Joe Cool though? He'd probably be smoking a lot of cigarettes. I don't know if I'd love him more. But you'd still love him even if he smoked. Yeah, I'm just getting confused how I feel about all this now. Okay, but yeah, probably to cut that part out. This is for element or a weapon element right now. All right. So the next category is what element flavor would you say best represents the other's personality? So each of us is going to pick for the other two, which element flavor you think best represents them. You know, I'll give you guys an example of how this is going to look. I'll go ahead and go first. Wesley goes first. I love going first all the time. I love hearing my own voice. Ah, Mike, I picked watermelon for you. My man. Because I know you love it. And I think it's one of the flavors that starts the most sour, but turns the sweetest. And I think you are a person that people often think is very sour. But when you get to know you, you're very sweet. You're a very sweet, nice person. Give me a lick. You'll see. And watermelon is the sweetest. And then Jeff, I picked grapefruit for you because I traditionally like, I like that's not the flavor that I would think would be my favorite. But I have just like grown to love it so much. I think it probably is my current favorite flavor. And it I think it's like one of the more interesting flavors in the element repertoire. And I think you of the three of us are the most interesting. So I picked it for you. Yeah. Well, thanks. Yeah. Yeah, I picked lemon for Mike because I think he's lemonade. Sour and he stays sour even when you have to know him really well. I'm really more with Jeff on this. I will say I love the new lemonade flavor that sort of is for you exclusively lately. Yes, I should say lemonade. And but like lemon desserts, kind of like lemon starburst, my favorite starburst lemon desserts. I'm a big fan of lemon desserts. So like, yeah, you know, maybe I just like sour and I like watermelon for him, though, because I think that's the fruitiest flavor and he's pretty fruity. That's true. And then I have three of us. I for sure am. I picked raspberry because raspberries are kind of small, but really good at what they do. I'd be in raspberries. I actually picked raspberry for Wes, too. I feel like they're, it's a flavor I'm excited to drink on any occasion, even if it if I'm not like dehydrated or hot. It's just like a drink that I like to have around, you know, and it's a little bit sour, but it's like the perfect level of sweetness. It's like that good balance of everything, you know, it always goes first. Yeah, it always it's the first one super into itself. Right. Yeah. For Jeff, I actually a little bit of reciprocation here. I picked the lemonade flavor, but more because I feel like it's just like a really bright, not just the yellow color, but like it's bright and refreshing. And it just feels kind of like when you need a little pick me up, lemonade is the go to drink like on a hot summer day. It's exactly what you want, exactly what you need. It gives you everything you could ever want. That's a lot better than my answer. All right. Good job, Link. All right. So Jeff, this is a surprise category I didn't want you to know about. I want you to explain what an electrolyte is. Just I want you to tell us what you think one might be. Just one electrolyte? What like definition of an electrolyte? Because I couldn't, there's no way I could say it. So I want to hear. Don't pickles have it like pickle juice and stuff? Yeah. Yeah. The track goes to making a drink pickle juice. I mean, it makes sense though, like water is good for you, but if you add some other stuff to it, it can be better even. Yeah. Great definition so far. Okay. But sometimes you can make it worse. Honestly, probably right on track, what I would have said, I always, I feel like we say electrolytes a lot and I have a hard time conceptualizing what they actually are. I know salts give us electrolytes. I know they're really good for us, like being less dehydrated and replenishing. But Mike, could you let us know what an electrolyte actually is? Yeah, there are little particles and minerals that are found in your body fluids like blood and sweat. They have an electric charge. And basically what they do is they help improve muscle and nerve functionality pretty much. And that's a pretty simplified version of. So is it like electric light? Yeah, kind of. I mean, there's some electricity, electrical charges, positive and negative, shocking your nerves a little bit. Getting it going. I don't know. I'm getting into pseudoscience now. Quick conservation corner. As far as I know, bark scorpions are doing great. They have plenty of habitat. They do pretty well existing on the fringes of human society. If you live in a place where you have scorpions around and you're worried about them, you can go out with a black light because they fluoresce bright green under a black light. That's a good way to find them and safely and gently remove them from your property and maybe release them out somewhere in better desert habitat. Sounds like a big threat to them might be sandals. Sandals. Yeah, flip flop is a good way to. Yeah, it's a good threat. All right. Finally, let's do our claw writing. Actually, we should do our cheese, too. Let's do our cheese for both Abby and Ian. About our cheese and the Coyote Peterson guy. Yeah, he gave it 9.8 for that. We don't have to do a readjust. I'm going to do for Abby. I'm going to do an eight. I think she talked more about the systemic stuff than the actual pain, but she definitely was like feeling a ton of pain. Ian, I'm going to do an eight as well. Ian said that it was super painful, but there's no actually, you know, I'm going to do sevens for both of them because there's no lasting effects. So I don't think we can give it an eight. So for me, I'm doing sevens. Yeah, I'm going fives forever across the board. Intimidation, I'm going to go like a three because I think a grizzly bear is a lot more intimidating than a scorpion and a shark. And I'd much rather get stung by a scorpion than a grizzly bear shark. So you know what? It does sound like in the moment, though, it seems like there's just like a hot coal going through your body, which it would be unbearably painful, except for at least it goes away. Not very chill. I think I'm going to go with six. I know through a whole night of kind of thinking and considering maybe you're dying is a pretty big mental burden to bear. But yeah, in the grand scheme of attacks that we've talked about, this one's not super high on my list. And then let's give them our claw rating or our pincer rating, if you will. I will. What do you guys think? How many claws for scorpions? I like scorpions. I always have scorpions. Arizona bark scorpion. Great. I'm going 100 out of 10. I love these guys. Top one animal of all time. What are those black ones called? Emperor scorpion. Those are my favorite scorpions. Okay. So I think with these, I'll probably give them like a six, but I do really like scorpions. They're pretty sweet. Yeah, I think I'll do like a seven. I think four invertebrates, they're pretty high for me. But I don't like spend a lot of time thinking about scorpions or really, and that specifically interested in them. They do, I think they give me the willies like a tiny bit too. You know, I not many animals do, but scorpions kind of have that look that do kind of give me a little bit of willies. I think if everything, like every animal on earth was the exact same size, they might be the scariest animal too. Oh, that's a good point. This would be like a good one for the everything's 200 pounds. Yeah, like I would be terrified of a scorpion if it was my size. Yeah, that's what happened in Clash of the Titans. Yeah, it was pretty scary, right? Yeah, it was. Or like Dwayne Johnson as a scorpion, like our scariest human and he's half scorpion. I think he's the scariest human. Dude, his elbow drop. Yeah, people's elbow. People's elbow. Are you kidding me, Wes? Yeah. All right, I'm sorry. I retract my statement. All right, well, that's it. As always, if you guys are interested in more content, please check out our Patreon or Apple Gris Club. I know Mike and Jeff just recorded a totally unhinged attacks at high altitudes episode that just from the comments I can tell really went off the rails, but people really liked it. So there's some really fun episodes on there. You're going to get access to honestly like double the content that you already have access to and a really fun community. So check it out. We're going to continue posting on there. It's really fun. Anyway, that's 10 bucks a month. So sign up if you want it. Mike's going to listen to Ian's interview. Yeah, zero chance. Sorry, Ian. You're a lovely guy, I'm sure. I wouldn't know. Well, thank you to the podcast Out Alive. Check out Out Alive if you want some more great stories. Thank you, Ian, for being on the episode. And thank you, Mike and Jeff, for being my best friends. And I sure love you and we'll talk to you later. Sure thing. Love you. See you. Bye.