A mum has issued a warning after her four-year-old son developed a severe rash all over his face and body after playing in their garden.
Caroline Gel said her son Oliver was playing outside on Tuesday (May 17), when he decided to befriend a caterpillar. Half an hour later, the young boy was complaining about a painful "stinging" sensation on his face and mouth - and woke up the next day with hives and rashes all over his body.
Carol is now hoping to share what happened to her son to warn others of the dangers that can come with touching these seemingly innocent critters. The 43-year-old from Oxfordshire said: "Oliver was learning about caterpillars at school as his class were reading the whole hungry caterpillar story.
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"So he went outside to play last week and took a caterpillar down off a tree. He even made a little house for it.
"Then around half an hour later, he was complaining about a sting on his face and mouth - my husband had recently cut the grass, so I thought it might have been a grass allergy or something".
The next morning, Oliver woke up covered in a severe rash all over his body. Caroline said it was particularly bad around his face and mouth.
She continued: "We took him to the doctors and they said they were unsure of the cause but suggested it might have been hives so gave him antihistamines to help with the inflammation."
The mum-of-three then decided to google the caterpillar Oliver was playing with - and discovered it was a brown tail moth caterpillar. This particular species has urticating hairs that cause an irritant effect - when they are in contact with human skin, they sometimes can result in breathing difficulties, rashes and hives.
Caroline, a career coach at Oxford University, added: "Oliver is always outside and is very curious. Normally I would never discourage him from touching things - but these insects are not very nice ones so I want to spread the word and make sure other people don't touch these caterpillars, especially children".
She has confirmed Oliver still has rashes but they are better than they were and have gone down thanks to the antihistamine and calamine location. Caroline said: "Oliver was very excited about caterpillars but not anymore - he's very vocal to people now telling them not to touch them."
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