WARNING: This story contains graphic images that may disturb some readers.
Although she didn’t feel it at first, Lily Doubleday is still recovering a week after she was bitten on the leg by an unknown insect.
The Falmouth, N.S. woman said she was touring her garden with a friend when they noticed a small, red mark on her leg that appeared to be inflamed.
"She said, ‘What's that on your leg?’” Doubleday recounted to CTV Atlantic on Monday. “I looked and I said, ‘I don't know. It stings though.’”
The reaction on Doubleday’s leg continued to grow in size overnight. By morning, the pain had become “unbearable,” she said.
“I can't put a bedsheet on it. I can't lay it on anything because [of] the sting," she said.
Doubleday’s doctors were unable to determine with certainty what caused the reaction, but they agreed it was the result of some type of bite. She has been given antibiotics while she recuperates at home, but her daughter is concerned about their efficacy.
“They don’t really know how to treat it besides antibiotics, but if it’s not an infection; it’s a reaction to the bite. What are antibiotics doing?” Angela Williams-Smith said.
The reaction on Doubleday’s leg is similar in size and shape to the one a man in Middle Cornwall, N.S. received on his thigh earlier this month.
In that instance, the man was told by a doctor that he was most likely bitten from a brown recluse spider. Although it’s not native to Nova Scotia, the venomous spider may have travelled to the province on fruit imported from the southwest United States.
There are no spiders native to Nova Scotia that would pose a danger to humans in a medical sense, according to biologist and spider expert Calum Ewing. Despite the resemblance between Doubleday’s reaction and the man in Middle Cornwall, Ewing said he doesn’t believe there are more brown recluse spiders in the province.
“I would think it’s extremely unlikely,” said Ewing.
Dr. Mark Williams said he sees about two patients per week for “local hyper-sensitivity reactions” to bug bites or stings.
“We don’t exactly know why it happens. We just know that it’s related to allergies,” he said.
Some biologists point to diseases like Lyme and West Nile as evidence that certain insect kingdoms are expanding. It’s a trend they expect to continue if summer months heat up and winters are milder.
“We are seeing a number of both insects and arachnids that are native to the northern United States. They’re sort of creeping up into the southern Canadian provinces,” Ewing said.
With a report from CTV Atlantic’s Bruce Frisko
