Five-year-old Aidan says as he played outside in his Pinckney yard a couple weeks ago, a caterpillar suddenly fell on him.
“It fell on me, into my shirt,” said Aidan. “And then it bit me. I think it has a stinger.”
He ran inside crying. His parents immediately knew something wasn’t right.
“It was an instantaneous thing that spread within a matter of minutes,” said Taniesha Drain, Aidan’s mom. “He was covered in a rash.”
The rash went from his face, down his neck, onto his chest, and under his armpit. They called the doctor’s office.
“The nurse said we needed to take him to the emergency room immediately,” said Drain.
It turns out Aidan came into contact with a White Hickory Tussock Moth Caterpillar. It looks cute with white and fluffy hairs. It also has black hairs that are filled with venom.
“The venomous hairs have barbs on them like fish hooks, so they can get inserted into the skin and stay there, causing anything from minor irritation to severe reaction,” said Dr. Pino Colone, the Henry Ford West Bloomfield Emergency Department Service Chief.
He says doctors started seeing patients in metro-Detroit with rashes from the venomous caterpillar in just the last couple of years. The caterpillar is native to Canada, but has apparently been moving south.
It took Aidan six days to get rid of his painful rash.
When his mom shared a post about the caterpillar on Facebook, she realized many people don’t know there is a poisonous caterpillar in metro-Detroit.
“I wanted to share our story for other moms,” said Taniesha. “Warn your kids about these caterpillars."
