In our old house we had run-ins with honey bees and black widows, but our new home has a dangerous insect that is really giving us the heebie jeebies.

Since moving in we have found 11 scorpions. 6 were dried up and had been dead for some time, 2 had been in our dirty laundry and died in the dryer, and I killed 3 tonight while hunting for them under the deck.

While researching how to get rid of them I found a great forum where tons of people had posted suggestions. One of the more interesting ones was that scorpions glow green when put under a black light. They suggested using a black light to “hunt” for them. I immediately went to Lowe’s and bought a black night, then when it got dark I prowled around the house and yard with it. Sure enough, I spotted 3 of them under the deck. They were dead soon after.

While a scorpion sting won’t kill you, it will hurt like the dickens. The worst part is that there is no antidote for the venom. You just have to wait it out like a sting ray sting (though peeing on a scorpion sting doesn’t help). Heidi learned in Ghana last year that Lidocaine works to relieve the pain temporarily. Lucky for us, we still have some of the drug from our trip. I pray that none of us get stung but if we do at least there is some hope for relief from the pain.