snuff paste on nasty bug bites works wonders. My girlfriend just tried it on here bug chewed arms and it is much happier.

i remember my granny putting snuff on my bee stings when i was a kid. i never knew if it was the snuff of granny’s kindness that made it better…evidently there’s healing power in snuff!

it’s the snuff.

When I was a kid my mom and grandmother would chew cigarette tobacco up till it was a paste and then put it on itchy or painful insect bites. On mosquito bites it would take the itch away and when they put it on my bee stings it would take the pain away. I was never sure if it was the tobacco, the spit or the combination of the two but it always worked on my siblings and me.

Interesting , I wonder if it works with general skin irritations as well ? Like acne ? If thats the case , im going to mix some Hedges with honey

I’m a beekeeper and have spit chewing tobacco on my bee stings…it works.

.I’ve thought about approaching my hives encased in a ‘protective tobacco- spit- coating’ all over exposed body parts.All I generally wear is a veil.(maybe even applying for a patent on this idea , similar to my "Beesting kit for ED sufferers idea that didn’t pan out)…but a word of warning…do NOt apply this salve when you are still near the hives

We would always make a paste out of whatever tobacco product was available for bee or wasp stings. Works wonders.

I remember my parents doing the same to me, only they would mix cig tobacco with vinegar for bee and wasp stings.

A fishing secret so shhh, this is serious. When every i’m fishing and they are not biting, i spit some coppenhagun juice on my bait, works every time.

I had great luck as a youngster using Beech Nut leaves for Bluegill and Crapi bait.

I am so gonna try the fishing secret.

Putting tobacco on any wound/bite/infection etc is more likely to irritate a wound, especially if it has menthol or other flavourings and chemicals not meant to aid healing. Any ‘healing’ is likely to be placebo and psychological, when in fact it may be prolonging the healing time through the irritation it causes.

Also putting saliva into a wound of any sort is quite dangerous if you’re unlucky as saliva is riddled with bacteria.

All in all, old wives tales and placebo. Just use cold water/ice to calm insect bites and let your body heal it naturally, for irritation skin healing creams, for acne avoid irritating your skin, and for a nicotine craving, just stick some snuff up your nose, that is the one place I’ll admit it belongs

hahahaha

Yeah, sorry dude, next time you get stung, throw some tobacco on it, particularly something moistened, and tell me it doesn’t help. Maybe nicotine is a mild anestetic, I dunno, but it works.

Herbalist prescribe tobacco as such. 

There’s a long history in herbalism of poultices, salves, ointments, etc made with various plant materials. So it shouldn’t be seen as too strange.

Never tried myself, but I always carry Zyrtek on me summertime after I got multiple bee stings few years back and got pretty bad allergic reaction.

I found this tidbit on the healing properties of tobacco. “The application of the tobacco plant to a cancerous tumor allegedly worked wonders. Nicot tried treating an acquaintance’s face wound for 10 days with the plant with excellent results. Nicot became convinced of the healing powers of tobacco” http://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=2058

nicotine is a an antihistamine! It stops the bodies allergic reaction which is what causes the pain and irritation and itching. I suspect this is why you sneeze less with bigger pinches then with smaller pinches of snuff. additionaly something in the tobacco breaks down certain complex protiens like bug spit. Additionaly saliva is highly highly antimicrobial it has to be, this is why dry mouth gives halitosis. If saliva was not antimicrobial we would all be fucked because it is a big wet hole we shove things in all the time.

I think I’ve known people with insufficient antimicrobials…

Bob, you’ve confirmed something I’ve noticed recently. I suffer from allergic rhinitis and normally I spend springtime sneezing my fool head off, even with prescription medication. Not this spring…and this is my first spring using snuff. Coincidence? Placebo effect? I dunno, but I’ll take it!

nope it’s the snuff. My allergies have gone way down since becomeing a snuff head. One of things I find annoying is when I have a sneezing fit some idiot will say that’s what happens when you use snuff. I wouldn’t mind if they didn’t always act superior and stupid and like I don’t know what I’am talking about when I say it was worse before doing snuff.

Also when you have allergies your mast cells which are the cells that trigger allergic reactions. When they are triggered they actualy pop and are destroyed. It’s part of the reason that mild exposure to allergians can be theraputic because it burns out the mast cells. I think that snuff helps reduce the number of mast cells in the nose reducing allergic reactions. Snuff is medicine and good for you, or at least I think it is.

@bob and with a much smaller list of potential side effects than most anything else on the market.

it’s amazing how that works.

@Theater  Until I see a scientific study which proves that tobacco doesn’t alleviate the pain of stings or stop the itch of insect bites then I will go with my personal anecdotal evidence that tobacco in fact does those two things.

@bob so do I just need to take a pinch or two and spit on it to make a paste ? Then rub it on the sting/bite.

I used tap water only.

Saliva does work though if you can’t get to a tap. Honestly saliva is all I ever use unless I have a can of dip on me, then I just apply a pinch directly to the sting. I assume loose snus would work just as well, but I’m not going out of my way to test that theory.

where is your sense of adventure?

Right behind my don’t-get-stung-by-stuff gland.

there is no such thing. It’s just a little bug with a toxic ass spike, not something really to worry about.

I don’t think that tobacco is anthistimic topically. I think it’s really about a cold poultice being soothing. I also do not believe it stops colds and flu. Or if it does it’s as equally not down to tobacco being healing. 10g a day seems to afford me bugger all protection from them.

It’s still getting into the blood stream so it should work topicaly. It certainly has more effects then a cold poultice speaking from experience. It also probably helps in the nose since nicotine is astringent. I won’t get into details but it seems to kill nasty germs and stuff.

I couldn’t tell a poultice from a cataplasm if my life depended on it, but it seems to me that if nicotine is the active ingredient, a Rustica-heavy natural snuff like Toque Quit would be ideal.

I don’t think there is any rustica in Toque Quit.

It probably works because lots of stings are acid and snuff is alkaline so neutralizing it. I do know that bicarbonate if soda it anti inflammatory also so snuff may have similar properties.

that too. I personaly think it’s because snuff is so good and bug bites are bad. Though by that logic if you have bug bites on your hand petting your cat or dog should cure flea bites.