[matt463]

Got a weird boil looking thing on my leg after being outdoors at wcj this week, sort of ignored it and assumed it was a weird bite. But after some medical googling it looks like a giant hogweed burn. Apparently there’s some of this stuff spreading in millers dale. Take care out there, can be pretty nasty

[Wood FT]

Stuff of nightmares that stuff, looks horrid. Where abouts were you?

[battery]

It's rife, I've seen it loads in hedge rows all over in Lancashire/Greater Manchester/Merseyside.

Definitely worth knowing how to spot it and how to differentiate between co parsley and hogsweed.

[steveri]

Oof, hope you’re ok. Funnily enough we saw some this afternoon along the Weaver in Cheshire after a crash course education from my daughter.

[SA Chris]

bastard stuff.

[Bonjoy]

Is this definitely the giant variety? The only GH I've ever seen in the peak was in the grounds of Chatsworth house. Where exactly was the plant?

[matt463]

Is this definitely the giant variety? The only GH I've ever seen in the peak was in the grounds of Chatsworth house. Where exactly was the plant?

Think it must have been between kudos wall and rubicon right. I walked between those two spots with my climbing shoes on and trousers rolled up. Which was stupidly lazy of me and the time spent cleaning my shoes could've just been spent taking them off.

[Bonjoy]

I'm 99.9% certain there is no giant hogweed in that vicinity. I was there last week.
Giant Hogweed is a huge plant, typically reaching 3m in height, but can get up to 5m tall! The stems of the plants I saw at Chatsworth were easily 10cm across at the base. Common Hogweed gets quite big (usually not higher than 1.5m) for an annual herb, but is not as easily confused with GH as alarming media articles would have you believe.

[Wellsy]

In the scouts I was always told that the sap makes the skin really vulnerable to sunlight and that causes the burns, not the sap itself, so if you get it on you wash it off and cover the area with a thick cloth and it'll prevent the worst of the burning.

[crzylgs]

In the scouts I was always told that the sap makes the skin really vulnerable to sunlight and that causes the burns, not the sap itself, so if you get it on you wash it off and cover the area with a thick cloth and it'll prevent the worst of the burning.

From my brief Googling (after being shocked by some of the photo results of bad cases!) washing the area and avoiding direct access to sunlight does indeed seem to be the best beta. So well done on your Scout troop for educating you with that knowledge!

[SA Chris]

If it wasn't GHW what caused the blisters? No blister beetles or the like here?

[petejh]

There's a crag in N.Ireland full of the stuff - Moorhill Quarry. The topo has some pics: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1QCuRdFZWSJ4ADA3Vxn6w4yTJqoV7M2mt/view
Personally I've been more concerned by the wild stallions fairly tame ponies that haze me whenever I've climbed there.

[Bonjoy]

I dropped into Rubicon today while passing through the area with work.
I had a good look around and while there is lots of Common Hogweed including some large examples, there is no Giant Hogweed. I took some photos if anyone wants make their own judgement.
I kept an eye out for GH for the rest of the journey (to a site near Manchester airport) and did actually see two locations where it is growing. One in an uncultivated field adjacent to the new bypass near the airport. The other was in and near the garden of the house on the A6/A623 roundabout between Doveholes and Chapel-en-le-Frith. The second location is almost in the Peak and there were quite a few plants. I had a look on the the UK Giant Hogweed map (thanks for the heads-up on this Carlos https://whatshed.co.uk/hogweed/map.html )and this site has already been reported. Which does beg the question, why has in not been destroyed, why let this stuff get a foothold when it's so nasty and very hard to deal with.

[SA Chris]

Indeed. Best caught early, and hammered hard. It was starting to grow on the banks of the burn just north of us, and SEPA took immediate action and luckily wiped it out in 2 years. I've seen it rife in other places, especially post pandemic.

[Ged]

So what caused the OP blisters I wonder then?

What's the most surefire way of identification to distinguish between giant, normal, and cow parsley?

[Bonjoy]

My uneducated guess would be insect bites, caterpillar spines, or an allergic reaction to something generally innocuous.
GH is pretty distinctive and is only really similar in appearance to common hogweed in the UK. Cow Parsley is much smaller with slender fern like leaves.
The main difference between the two hogweed is size. Even an immature giant is a hefty plant with large robust leaves and stems. Other than that the shape is different, but that's hard to describe simply. GH has rusty purple/red spotting on the stems CH has purple blending into green, any spotting is very minor.
The difference is akin to that between a panther and a domestic cat. They are superficially similar but on a different scale, plus some subtle shape differences.

[JamieG]

an allergic reaction to something generally innocuous.

This is what I would suspect. Sometimes, if I get even a small scratch from brambles it reacts strongly with a bumpy hive type reaction. Not sure why. Most people just have a small scratch.

[matt463]

Yea that's probably right. I wasn't convinced until I saw this (https://www.derbytelegraph.co.uk/news/warning-britains-most-dangerous-plant-7195020). Concerning though that it could spread.

[Bonjoy]

Makes me wonder if the Chatsworth Estate did anything about the patch of GH on a compost heap I found up near the Hunter's Tower. Reported it to them by email but never got a reply. It was right by a fairly busy path too.

[Wellsy]

They've always had loads of the stuff

Which makes sense as originally it was imported as an ornamental plant back in the day. A very clever move.

[SA Chris]

This is what I would suspect. Sometimes, if I get even a small scratch from brambles it reacts strongly with a bumpy hive type reaction. Not sure why. Most people just have a small scratch.

Cellulitis. My daughter gets it very easily from any minor scratch or graze.

[JamieG]

This is what I would suspect. Sometimes, if I get even a small scratch from brambles it reacts strongly with a bumpy hive type reaction. Not sure why. Most people just have a small scratch.

Cellulitis. My daughter gets it very easily from any minor scratch or graze.

I don’t think it’s cellulitis I get from brambles. It comes up pretty quickly and the fades again quite soon too. Definitely now like an allergic reaction.

[Bonjoy]

Just found an interesting article, which goes into some detail about the allergenic properties of this whole family of plants, which includes celery, which is apparently the commonest food allergy in Europe. The bottom line being that common hogweed has been reported to cause skin blistering in some people. Especially people who've previously worked a lot with celery! Who knew?
https://monicawilde.com/is-common-hogweed-poisonous/

[SA Chris]

Can't think many people that would have "worked a lot with celery" on their CV

[petejh]

Maybe someone who worked at a winery…

[moose]

Celery is part of the "holy trinity" of Cajun (and Creole) cookery, so Paul Prudhomme and those chaps in Deliverance need to take care.

[SA Chris]

I actually get paid celery.

No wait that's salary.