- I can guarantee you that, on North Bass Island,
there are gazillions of chiggers,
probably more than there are stars in the sky.
Tall grasses like this are an absolute perfect place
for chiggers, to almost like ticks,
quest and get themselves on their host species.
Now, I'm barefoot, which I would never recommend,
but considering the fact that
I am trying to get myself bitten by chiggers,
this seems like an interesting way
to possibly accomplish that feat.
(suspenseful music) (earth rumbling)
Okay, today is a solo expedition
where I am going to attempt to be eaten alive by chiggers.
Now, we'll learn more about chiggers
as we embark upon this expedition, but I will be kayaking
from Middle Bass to North Bass Island in the hopes of
finding a swarm of these microscopic creatures.
This is going to be an epic adventure.
(boat engine roaring)
It will take me roughly an hour and 15 minutes
to kayak from Middle Bass to North Bass Island,
and then once we make it to North Bass,
I will enter the island through Manila Bay.
That gives me the entry point to the large marsh.
A beautiful morning to be on the water, that's for sure.
(suspenseful music)
So what exactly is a chigger?
Well, to keep it simple, they're the larva stage
of something called a harvest mite.
Technically considered arachnids,
they belong to the same class as ticks and spiders,
but unlike their larger cousins,
while in the larva stage, they're so tiny,
they can't be seen with the human eye,
and measure 1/50th of an inch or less.
Okay, we have made it to
the western edge of North Bass Island.
I gotta say, the solo expedition filming
is not super simple, so I gotta give a big shout-out
to my main man Les Stroud,
who filmed all those seasons of "Survivorman" by himself.
Holy cow.
Actually, going through all this underbrush
might help me get chiggers.
An old tree has fallen down
right in the middle of this place.
There we go.
Oh, whoa!
Oh, almost lost the GoPro there.
(foreboding music) (Coyote grunting)
What a mess.
Jeez.
Okay, status update.
I'm in the middle of the marsh.
The moving has gotten a little bit easier
through these big lily pads.
They're taller, which allows me to
glide through the environment just a touch better,
but when it comes to finding any animals,
I mean, they can hear me coming from a mile away, so.
Oh, I see an eagle's nest,
and two eagles inside the eagle's nest.
Holy cow.
All right, first animal of the expedition is officially
a juvenile bald eagle,
and you can see there's another one
a little bit higher up in the tree.
Very cool.
(upbeat music)
Ah, this place is just swallowing me alive.
(Coyote grunts)
There's only so many shots you can possibly get
while being stuck in a prehistoric swamp,
or prehistoric-looking rather.
The only other thing missing from this is maybe
some Brachiosaurs grazing on all this plant life.
That'd make it a little bit more interesting.
While there is a chance
I could encounter a species of chigger in the marsh,
it is much more likely that I will become a buffet line
if I venture to the other side of the island
to explore on foot.
An interesting little forest area here.
Look at this rock structure.
Now, I'm barefoot,
which I would never recommend entering a forest barefoot,
but considering the fact that
I am trying to get myself bitten by chiggers,
this seems like an interesting way
to possibly accomplish that feat.
Old dilapidated structure here.
Every once in a while,
when you stop at a random spot on an island
and start exploring lost areas,
you come across some pretty cool stuff.
The harvest mite life cycle can vary
and depends heavily on species and environment,
but what's crazy is that these alien-looking arachnids
can live for nearly a year.
Most eggs hatch within a week.
This is known as the pre-larva stage,
and after developing for several days,
they evolve into hungry parasites.
This is the six-legged chigger phase,
and, boy, are they ravenous.
They target a host, engorge on skin and eventually fall off.
Plump and happy, they are now in the nymph stage,
where they develop another pair of legs
and mature into the adult phase.
As adults, they feed on tiny arthropods and their eggs,
live in the soil, eventually breed, and the cycle repeats.
(suspenseful music)
(Coyote chuckles)
Check out the shoe I just found.
That is a Nike Air Foamposite,
worn by Penny Hardaway,
my favorite basketball player of all time.
(upbeat music)
That is insane.
Any sneakerhead out there knows
that this is actually a very expensive shoe
to find on the side of an abandoned island.
This is the All Black edition.
I have the blue and the black tiger stripe ones.
I'm gonna definitely keep that.
(Coyote humming)
We're docking.
Okay, I have landed in my final destination
on North Bass Island.
Now we're gonna take to foot
and see what sort of things we can find.
Now, the goal is to find
some tall grasses that I can walk through,
eventually sit down in it and have a drink water,
and see if I collect any chiggers.
So, tall grasses like this
are an absolute perfect place for chiggers to,
almost like ticks, quest and get themselves
on their host species.
Pretty much any terrestrial species
has the potential of picking up chiggers.
Pretty much got to the end of this round of the field.
I think I'm gonna cut over and go down another track.
(foreboding music) (Coyote sighs)
It is unbearably hot.
It felt a lot better on the water.
This looks like another great place to get chiggers.
Look at that.
Let's walk in here and see what happens.
Into the underbrush.
Whoa, this is very disorienting.
Okay, I have completely been swallowed
by grasses that are taller than I am,
covered in mayflies, ugh.
I'm just gonna sit here for a few minutes,
give any little bugs the opportunity to get on me,
and, trust me, the chiggers will know that I am here
if they are present in these grasses,
because they can sense all of the sweat and carbon dioxide
coming off of my body.
A chigger bite is painless,
but the way it happens will make your skin crawl.
(ominous music)
These parasites attach to a host,
pierce the skin with their chelicerae,
inject enzymes into the bite wound
that break down cell content into a digestible meal,
and then suck up the liquified tissue
through a tube formed by hardened skin cells
called a stylostome.
Ugh, gross!
The aftermath arrives in 24 to 48 hours
in the form of unsightly red welts
that seem to itch unstoppably.
This is your body's natural histamine reaction
to the invasive saliva.
Contrary to popular belief, they do not suck blood
and they do not grow into your skin to lay eggs.
However, chiggers can stay with, explore,
and feast on a host for several days before falling off,
and because of the delay in bite reaction,
that is why welts can show up day after day after day.
You definitely will not be able to
see them with a naked eye, but they're here.
Trust me. They are here.
Now, the worst part about chiggers is that,
most of the time,
they try to burrow down into areas that are hard to get at.
So, like your belt slash underwear line, around your ankles.
They like tight, compact, warm areas
that have soft skin and good blood flow.
So, right now, there's the chance that
they are getting on me.
Now, a bite, you will not feel, but if I am bitten,
the reaction will present itself within 24 to 48 hours,
and I can guarantee you that, on North Bass Island,
there are gazillions of chiggers,
probably more than there are stars in the sky,
because I've gotten chiggers on this island before,
and, without a doubt, I have a feeling that, right now,
with my legs down in the grasses just like this,
I am probably getting them on me at the moment.
(foreboding music)
Well, I'm on my way back from North Bass Island.
I kayaked all the way around it.
I went into the marsh. We scouted the swamp.
I found all sorts of treasures,
including a Nike Air Foamposite,
and, with any luck, I am now covered in chiggers.
I did my best to find the tallest grasses possible,
went into them, sat down,
and hopefully they are on my body at this point.
All right, guys, stay tuned.
We'll see you in the aftermath.
(gentle music)
Okay, well, it has been 48 hours
since I returned from North Bass Island,
and I've got some good news and some bad news.
The good news is that
I was successfully eaten alive by chiggers.
The bad news is that
all the bites are in areas I can't really show you
if we want to keep this episode rated PG.
Now, I find that the bites become inflamed
every time I get out of the shower,
and you want to itch and itch and itch and itch them,
which is actually the worst thing you can do.
If you open up the bites,
you can get bacteria inside of them,
and ultimately an infection may form.
What you wanna do is apply Chiggerex.
This is the original, two times strength,
and with 10% benzocaine.
I applied this just before I go to bed,
and I managed to sleep 12 hours
through the night with no itching.
In the morning, I reapply it
and go the entire day, no itching,
and I want to continue applying it
until the chigger bites have completely subsided.
Trust me, chiggers are no fun,
and while I know you guys can't really see
what's going on with me right now,
trust me, as soon as this wears off,
it becomes very uncomfortable,
but if you find yourself this summer
in the worst case scenario,
whether it's in a backyard picnic
or exploring an abandoned island,
and you manage to get eaten alive by chiggers,
Chiggerex is the one thing
that is gonna help alleviate all of that itching.
For more information, make sure to visit their website,
and hopefully you don't have to go through
the itchy scenario that I am facing right now.
I'm Coyote Peterson.
Be brave. Stay wild.
We'll see on the next adventure.
(somber music)
(animals calling) (earth rumbles)