Fist Full of Dirt
Welcome to Fist Full of Dirt, the official podcast of Mossy Oak Properties hosted by Ronnie "Cuz" Strickland. Whether you own a small farm, lease land or just love hangin' in your backyard.. we’re all about the outdoor lifestyle and how to get the most from your time in God’s great Outdoors.
Fist Full of Dirt
FFOD328 : What Every Outdoorsman Should Know About Alpha-Gal
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We’ve been hearing more and more about Alpha-gal syndrome and because so many of us spend our lives outdoors, I wanted to spend some time digging into this important topic. So this week I’m joined by Dr. David Allen, a healthcare professional who has personally lived with Alpha-gal syndrome for more than two decades. That unique perspective gives him insight not only as a medical expert, but as someone who understands the actual challenges that come with this condition.
We discuss how Alpha-gal develops, why cases are increasing, symptoms to watch for, common misconceptions, diagnosis, treatment options and what every hunter, landowner and outdoor enthusiast should know about tick borne illnesses. Please join us for an important conversation that could impact you or someone you know.
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Welcome to Fistful of Dirt, the official podcast of Mossy Oak Properties. Whether you own a small farm, lease land, or just love hanging in your backyard. We're all about the outdoor lifestyle and how to get the most from your time in God's great outdoors. Now here's your host, Ronnie Cuz Strickland.
SPEAKER_02Semi-Live from the Camo Cave. Semi-Live. Update on my summer food plot. You know, there I I guess I've talked a couple times about the drama I had last year. This year, I was kind of proud on my timing and everything. I drilled and I've posted a few pictures of it. I I crimped through a old some old food plot stuff with a drill. And I went back and checked it, and uh the grass I'd cramped through, which was mostly cereal rye, it was dead. I was like, well, if it comes back up, I'll mow it. Well it didn't.
SPEAKER_04Right.
SPEAKER_02And all of a sudden I got all kind of greenery popping up. Some soybeans and some uh iron clay peas and millet and Milo, stuff like that. And I'd go down there like every two or three days just checking on it, thinking sticking my chest out, going, Man, I am s I'm I'm smart. I'm getting uh I'm getting a handle on this. Well then it started raining. And I ain't gonna I'm trying not to complain about the the rain because it will not quit. Anyway, I've been going down there checking on it and I stopped for about a week because it's just been rain, rain. I went in there yesterday and the halls have just torn it up.
SPEAKER_04It's the actual definition of if it's not one thing, it's another. Oh, yeah. With you and your plant, and it's sad.
SPEAKER_02I don't know why they got in there because it you know, the plants were six, eight inches tall. It wasn't like there was any seeds around or anything. Everything had germinated, but and I've had, you know, we'll occasionally get a wild hog through there. I mean, they show up very seldom. I don't think we got one picture this year during deer season. Anyway, this was way more than one. So I put a couple of cameras down there and I'm putting an attack plan together. I sent Ty some pictures. He said, Is this this ain't the first time I went, No, but at this level. I mean, there was one spot there, it's like twenty-five yards across and twenty yards. It was just mind-blowing.
SPEAKER_04It's startling when it went from pristine to that.
SPEAKER_02Bam. And they do it quick.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_02And uh the thing about them is you can't just like, well, I'll just go sit down there with a gun because you know, they're they're two in the morning.
SPEAKER_04Right.
SPEAKER_02Three in the morning, one a.m. They just oh, they're just evil.
SPEAKER_04You gotta make a plan.
SPEAKER_02Yep, that's what it is. So I don't know what I'm gonna do. I know I gotta fill those holes in because if you run over those with a tractor, you might get your neck broke or flip your tractor. Some of them are foot deep already.
SPEAKER_03But I hate it.
SPEAKER_02I'm telling you this, if you live in a place where you don't have them, you're blessed.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, that's true.
SPEAKER_02But don't get cocky because at some point you probably will. I'm waiting on somebody to come up with a plan because I don't have a helicopter. I can't shoot them out of a helicopter and I don't have a trap. I'm gonna I'm gonna start going down some rabbit holes on uh DIY redneck traps or hogs or whatever it is.
SPEAKER_04We'll figure it out.
SPEAKER_02Anyway, and they may go away. It's rained so much that you know there's water everywhere, and we, you know, we're on the upside of a giant creek bed, you know, bottom down through there. And uh maybe they're just run up up out of the bottom because everything's flooded.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. I feel like that's what happened. That was the only thing that changed.
SPEAKER_02We shall see. Things change a lot. Didn't have to worry about hogs when back in the day, you very seldom unless you were, you know, down there on the I mean on the banks of the Mississippi River, you would hear about wild hogs. Remember my Pepoff. Yeah, he wrote a story about uh hunting hogs with Jughead Jones. That's right. Called The Death of a King, but it just wasn't uh you didn't hear about it back then. Of course you didn't hear about a lot of stuff.
SPEAKER_04I was just fixing to say, speaking of things you didn't used to have to worry about.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, uh peanut allergies, uh kids acting up in school.
SPEAKER_04Gluten intolerance.
SPEAKER_02It's uh it's like, what happened?
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_02We're gonna we're gonna visit, you know, Lauren and I were looking at something the other day and she's like, Did you get any ticks during turkey season? And I'm like, You'll hear later in this. I don't hardly ever get 'em.
unknownRight.
SPEAKER_02I don't know if it's my I'm too acidic or whatever, but anyway, we we were going down the Alpha Gal rabbit holes.
SPEAKER_04It's a rabbit hole.
SPEAKER_02And I said, You know, every you pick up your phone, you I don't care if you're on TikTok or wherever, Instagram, it's uh everywhere.
SPEAKER_04Yes.
SPEAKER_02And she reminded me, said, You know, your buddy Dr. David Allen has that. And I said, That's right.
SPEAKER_04For decades.
SPEAKER_02I said, What a good one to do a podcast with. Because number one, when he gets on something, he's like a bulldog. And uh we played golf a weekend or so ago, and uh of course it was just hit and drag cuz, hit and drag cuz, but he's used to that. It was a scramble where you take the best shot. But anyway, I was talking to him about that and I said, Would you do a podcast on that? He said, Oh yeah. So we loaded up and went over there, and Lauren told me when we were going in there, she said, You know he's gonna have 15 pages of notes. And guess what?
SPEAKER_04He had 15 pages of notes.
SPEAKER_02So if you want to know anything about Alpha Gal, we're fixing to find out. Dr. David Allen, not only is he one of the smartest people, I know he he actually has it and has some great stories about it. So uh let's and Lauren and I may go down a few rabbit holes when this is over. But for right now, let's go visit with my buddy Dr. David Allen and get the ins and outs of uh the latest problem.
SPEAKER_09A new summer health alert tonight about a rare red meat allergy linked to ticks, the CDC calling an emerging public health problem and warning cases in the U.S. are on the rise. We get more from Raheem Ellis.
SPEAKER_01Ah, yes, tick season is here, and the little buggers are pretty much everywhere. And Lyme disease isn't the only thing you have to worry about.
SPEAKER_00For the first time, the state is going to track cases of another tick bite complication, which can trigger an allergic reaction. WBZ's Aaron Parsegian shows us what we need to watch out for.
SPEAKER_06Well, the newer kind of tick for an illness that presents as a sudden allergy to eating meat is starting to become more common on Long Island.
SPEAKER_11All right, Fox Over breaks down what to know about Alpha Gal syndrome and why we're seeing more cases.
SPEAKER_12Well, here to share more about a condition that causes a rare allergy that could change your diet forever is Dr.
SPEAKER_08Emily Campbell. New studies show other tick species bites could be linked to causing alpha gal syndrome. AGS is called the red meat allergy because it causes an allergic reaction to a sugar molecule found in most mammals. Two papers published by the CDC found the black-legged and western black-legged tick play a limited role in causing it. CBC epidemiologist Joanna Salzer says the disease is primarily caused by a bite from the lone star tick.
SPEAKER_02He is my health care professional, and uh, you know, I told you that you can't go on the internet anymore. I don't care where you go, Instagram, TikTok, whatever, without seeing Alpha Gal and Lyme disease, especially Alpha Gal. And Lauren looked at me and said, You know, your best friend has it. I said, I know. Let's do a podcast. So here we are, Dr. David Allen. Glad to be here. Thank you, my brother. I got a long list of questions, and this may take a little while, but people have questions.
SPEAKER_05That's all right. I've had it for 20 years, Alpha Gal.
SPEAKER_02Tell me, tell me, do you remember getting bit by the tick?
SPEAKER_05I like to bow hunt, as you know. Yeah. And you know, if you kill a deer in the woods uh during bow season, you know, they're covered in ticks, and you drag them out. Plus just going in, getting set up and all that, when you come out, uh, you know, you have to check yourself. You know, it's kind of hard to use propellant if you're trying to kill a deer, you're watching the wind, you don't want to smell like deet. So you just check real good when you get out. And I'm just telling you, I a year, I don't recall a year going by that I don't have a tick of some sort. Normally I catch them beforehand, but you know, uh, I don't remember getting bitten, but I know I had been bitten. I get bitten every year, during bow season mainly. So I can't say that, oh yes, I remember the bite and then it happened the next week, but I can tell you this I do get bitten every yeah, and I can tell you exactly the night I uh I had my first reaction. My wife uh I came home on a Sunday afternoon, um I don't remember what time of year it was.
SPEAKER_02Um It was either bow season or golf season.
SPEAKER_05That's what it was. I think it was came in for bow hunting. It was Sunday night, and uh she had cooked ribeys, and um we didn't eat a ton of steak and all that anyway, uh, but we ate it and uh we ate hamburgers and stuff like that. And she cooked a ribeye and I ate it, and I said, baby, I don't know what you did to this steak, but this is the best tasting steak I've ever had in my life. And she goes, Really? I said, What did you put on it? She said, I just put Dale's seasoning sauce. I said, Well, let's do it again, because this is I've never had one this good. That was about seven o'clock that night. Two o'clock in the morning, I woke up, my hands were itching like crazy, they were swollen. I thought I'd fallen asleep with my hand behind my head or something, and I'd gotten it. I'm thinking neurologic, you know, I'm a chiropractor, I think I got a pinch nerve in my neck. And I go in there and I look at my hands and they're swollen. I look at my face, and my face is swollen, my lips are swollen, and I'm sitting here putting cold water on my hands because I hadn't related it to anything. I'm not thinking I'm having a reaction. And uh just itching horribly, and uh started getting a rash, didn't really sleep much, got up the next morning, and I and I was covered in a rash. Uh and it was crazy, it was over half of my body, like the right side of my chest was just terrible. I said, I gotta find something out. And went to see my buddy, um uh Dr. Bob Collins was head of MSU's uh uh longest student health center. So I went to see Bob. Bob looked at it and he goes, Look, you got some kind of food allergy. You know, it's not contact dermatitis, you got some kind of food allergy. And uh I said, Okay, I think he gave me a steroid shot or something like that. And by two o'clock, it was mostly gone. So next week, Sunday afternoon, my wife cooks hamburgers. And I said, What'd you put on them? And she goes, Dales. I said, Hope I'm not allergic to Dales. I said, That might have been it. Ate the burger, and same thing, I said, This is the greatest hamburger I've ever had in my life. I don't know what it was. And uh, same thing, two o'clock in the morning, bam, it happened. I said, I guess I'm allergic to Dales. And uh, same thing, I knew what it was this time, or I knew I had a food allergy or something. Two o'clock the next afternoon it was gone. So I said, Well, I guess it's Dale's. Two weeks later, uh, where my daughter played select soccer and we had a tournament down in Hattiesburg, and the dads were cooking out for the girls. We were at a park and um they cooked burgers. And I asked one of the dads, I said, What's on those hamburgers? He said, Nothing. Just meat. He said, Meat and pepper. I said, Are you sure there's nothing on it? He said, Absolutely nothing. I said, All right, ate two hamburger patties, two o'clock in the morning in a hotel in Hattiesburg. I wake up, this time I got welz. It looked like I've sat in an ant bed. And um I just covered in welz and I said, It's it must be beef, you know. I said, because they didn't put anything on it, so it's gotta be beef. And so I went along for a long time knowing I could not eat beef. And um I ended up, you know, uh and or else I'd get a reaction. I didn't have any beef for probably six months after that. We went uh uh we were at Daryl Daig's house and he had a bunch of people over, and uh heck y'all might have been there for all I know. The um the um uh the it was his wife made some pork and beans and I ate the porkin beans and I'm thinking and I'm I'm telling ya, I told her, I said, these are the best pork and beans I've ever had in my life. And she knew about my beef allergy, Cindy and her talked, and she went, There's hamburger meat in there. I said, I pushed away from it. I'm telling you, I didn't have but two bites, and I pushed away from it. I said, uh oh. And before when I got home that night, my hands were itching like crazy, so it happened again. So knew for a fact that it was beef. But that's how I started this 20 years ago. They didn't know what Alpha Gal was when I got it. Cases were showing up, but there was no diagnosis or anything like that.
SPEAKER_02It was a little more rare back then.
SPEAKER_05It was a lot more rare.
SPEAKER_02You know, uh when you first told me about this, we started hanging out, and I noticed you wasn't eating any beef, and I told Pam, I said, you know, David takes pretty good care of himself. I think that's just part of his diet. I think he's you know, he eats a lot of chicken and veggies and all that stuff. He's very healthy. And we went to the Ted Nugent concert and they had those smoked pork sausage.
SPEAKER_05And you remember they had hot dogs on one side and pork sausage on the other. You got the pork. And I asked them what's in that and they said beef. I said, What's in that? They said pork.
SPEAKER_02But it was in a a beef skin or something like that. It made it and it lit you up, my. And we're gonna talk about wild game, but look, people got questions. Well, first off, I want you to kind of just skimming over the top as a doc, uh, tell me the difference in alpha gal and Lyme disease. Because you you're seeing more now about alpha gal than you are Lyme disease. What's the difference?
SPEAKER_05Alpha Gal is an allergic reaction um to the alpha galactose sugar molecule. Now, um animals, mammals have this sugar in them. People don't. Right? Now, um it is now known that the lone star tick is transferring this, it will attach to another animal or something, it'll get the alpha galactose molecule in its saliva, and if it attaches to you, it can transfer it. So um it is an allergic reaction to the alpha galactose molecule and the rash and the anaphylaxis and all that other stuff, is an overreaction of your body's immune system. It's IgE, immunogloglobulin E, that kind of overdoes it and gives you the big reaction. So it is an allergic reaction. Lyme's disease is completely different. It is a bacteria that is transmitted and carried by a tick. Okay.
SPEAKER_02Different kind of tick.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, the bacteria, it's normally a black-legged tick. Yeah. Okay. Now, um, the bacteria is called Borelia bergdorferi. Uh now there's another one called Borelia mayoni, but both of these are bacteria and it is a bacterial infection. Now, Lyme's disease, if you don't get it treated, it can go out of control and you can die. I had a friend of mine who lived in Bolton. Uh, he died from it before they knew what it was. I mean, by the time they figured it out, it was too late. Um, but uh Lyme's disease is an allergic reaction. While it could be deadly, that would be from anaphylaxis and not from the other. But it's they're two completely different things. They're just carried by the same, you know, they're carry carried by ticks.
SPEAKER_02Lone star tick is the alpha gal tick.
SPEAKER_05Lone star tick's alpha gal. It is a normal-looking tick, but it's got a white speck right in the middle of his back. You can't miss it.
SPEAKER_02I was doing a little research. I'm not as smart as you, but I I everybody starts sending me stuff and all that. And it right now, it's way more common up, you know, on the East Coast, Virginia, North, lot out in Montana and stuff like that. And we we may go down a couple of rabbit holes, but I saw where the the I I needed I I I would like to know why it's so common right now. It's just going crazy. Uh I saw a thing on Newsmax and they said uh the infections of Alpha Gal were up some stupid number, three hundred percent in like the last six years or something like that.
SPEAKER_05Well um mainstream folks are saying the two main causes for it being seeing so many more cases now. One is the increased range of the lone star tick, so they're spreading, so more people are coming in contact with it. The other thing is is more awareness. People are getting beef allergies, they've heard about it, and they go in and they actually get checked and they get diagnosed. There wasn't a diagnosis when I got it. I just knew I couldn't eat beef. That's heartbreaking, too. Well, the only thing I missed was a big juicy hamburger. Um uh that's really the only thing I missed.
SPEAKER_02You like them elk burgers we made up, didn't you? Oh my gosh. I took I killed a really big elk, deboned it by myself, got that thing all the way back, and uh took it to a pro and we mixed it with pork fat. And I told the guy a hundred times, it's got to be 100% pork fat. I don't even want you to take nothing out of an ice chest that's had beef in it. And man, they were good. So I know why you're so fired up about that. Oh gosh, it was amazing. Do different people have different symptoms? Because you seem to control yours pretty well. Can it get worse than what you have?
SPEAKER_05Uh it can. I mean, the worst symptom you can get is anaphylaxis, which is like a wash thing, and you get anaphylaxis and you close up and and you die. Okay, you can get that. Um the most common is uh hives and itching, and I can attest to that. Um swelling of the lips, face, throat, and eyelids, I got that the very first time I got it. And I'll I'll say something about that in just a second. Wheezing or shortness of breath, I've never had that. Stomach pain, diarrhea, nausea, or vomiting, I've never had that. Um but the the itching in the hives are something that happens to me every single time. And my hands swell up, and my hands, there's no rash on my hands, but my hands swell, and you know, it's almost like you've been real cold and your hands kind of start waking up and they start stinging like that, and it's it's kind of like that.
SPEAKER_02The symptoms always happen in the same time frame with people. You said yours was two in the morning.
SPEAKER_05Um it's pretty quick. In most cases, um onset of symptoms, um you you eat you know, mammalian meat, and we'll go into the different types of that. And it takes anywhere from you know, four or five to eight hours for your body to per to produce the IgE uh overreaction, the inflammatory response. So you ingest it and you get it, and your body sees it as a bad thing, and it starts attacking it, and it starts ramping up its IgE antibodies, so it takes a while. It's not unlike poison ivy. You know, when you the rash that you get from poison ivy is your body's reaction to the protein. And it's a similar thing going on here. If you can rub poison ivy on your arm, you don't get a rash right now, but you seven, eight hours tomorrow you will. Okay. It's it's kind of similar to that. But yeah, for me, meat at seven o'clock, two o'clock in the morning. That's it. Every time.
SPEAKER_02Every time.
SPEAKER_05Every time. Now, Ted Nugent, we were down there, what, six? We were coming home at eleven, and I started itching on the way home. So That was the early stage. That might have been five. So it's about six, yeah, about six hours.
SPEAKER_02Um let's don't forget to talk about the different kinds of meats that can trigger that. But is it is the only way to get diagnosed now is it is it just through blood work?
SPEAKER_05Um The crazy thing about it is it's uh the main thing is really what happened to me. Okay. In other words, you have onset of symptoms after eating beef in your adult life. after eating mammalian meat when it's never bothered you before. That's uh Okay, so in other words, you've eaten flag you've eaten your meat you meet your whole life and then you eat it and all of a sudden you're having a reaction. Okay. Uh and you have the reaction to eating beef or other uh things. You get uh itching, you get hives, you can get GI symptoms. The reactions start from three to eight hours after ingesting. They do have a test where you can get a positive IgE test, antibody test now. Now and when you don't eat it, this is part of the diagnosis. When you don't eat these products and you don't have a reaction then that's positive. Okay. Just saying okay. And then uh uh large local reaction to new tick or arthropod bites. I have been bitten since then and I have r reacted worse to tick bites. Really?
SPEAKER_02Yeah and um so yes it is um uh uh and you know um can uh that's that's the way they diagnose it can the uh can the red meat thing can can it be can alpha gal be like diagnosed wrong can they can't yeah for a long time uh people who actually had alpha gal were diagnosed with irritable bowel syndrome or just a food allergy just like I was they said oh you just got a food allergy and um um okay uh food's a pretty big category to help you out well I I narrowed it down I told you about how I narrowed it down we narrowed it down to meat when I quit eating meat just like the diagnosis says when I don't eat beef I don't get the rash period period you know old timer builds knives with durability in mind they also want it to be a tool that is comfortable enough to work with day after day since the beginning old timers made knives for those who don't rely on others to get the job done I love that old timer built for generations I love more than teaching my grandkids how to be better woodsmen. The Onex app helps me do that in a way that makes sense to them. They're all about apps and that phone. Using Onex to set optimal wind on stands that should or shouldn't be hunted on certain winds makes it easy for them to understand that hey a north wind blows from the north not to the north. Using that little slope angle layer when teaching them how to read topographical maps with the color coded shading makes it a lot easier to explain to them what tightly stacked ho lines mean. Bottom line Onex Hunt makes learning fun for those young ones and still helps me find success in the field.
SPEAKER_05It's an easy to use platform hey even I can do it I suggest it for any age outdoors you're listening to Fistful of dirt with Cunt Strickland presented by Mossy Oak Properties Can people have very mild reactions to it and may not even realize they have alpha some people just have stomach problems and they're diagnosed with irritable bowel syndrome and they just think well I just got stomach problems right other people might itch a little bit and not be that bad um you know the the severity of the reaction you have has a lot to do with how much of the alpha galactose sugar that you ingest. There are some cuts of meat that have more of it in it than others. Okay there are so you could get um I had a friend he suspected he had it because he got when he started eating meat he lived on a farm and he'd been bitten by ticks um but uh he suspected he had it but he said he thought his was because of uh hormones or antibiotics in the meat because he started eating grass fed um organic meat and there was a farm not too far from that did that and he didn't react to that. Now um research does show more of the antibodies are found in fatty cuts of meat. My first cut of meat was a ribeye and it tore me up. That was my worst I've never had another ribeye since and I haven't had that since but fatty cuts of meat tend to have more of the um uh of the alpha galactose uh molecule in it than some other cuts so um what a that has been true for me that's a cruel joke to put that's to and you know ribeye with all that marble and stuff yeah that's what it is and it's the fatty cuts that have more of it in there. Do uh uh is there any other kind of food other than red meat that might trigger that according to the diagnosis and all that they say it's all mammalian meat okay meaning hooved animals meaning sheep meaning pigs meaning um supposedly venison you know deer maybe elk just just hooved animals which don't bother you no I can eat deer meat it doesn't bother me a bit elk the only thing that bothered me about elk is I wanted to eat twenty five pounds of it uh but um um no I don't have any reaction to any of those things isn't that something yeah I can eat deer meat it's not a problem my daughter was camping in uh the Smoky Mountains and she got bitten by a tick like six years ago and she reacted violently to pork and beef she's got it she and she reacted violently to pork and beef and since then she can now eat pork she just can't eat beef. Just overcame it a little bit I don't know if you overcome it because when you research it you find that there are times when you might could get a particular cut of meat that just didn't have a lot of that molecule in it. Okay. Uh for whatever reason. Maybe that's the same in in deer or other things. Um but uh yeah there are times you can you can uh get it and there's just not enough in there to give you a reaction and then sometimes it is but you know for me beef just does it every time.
SPEAKER_02Man that's bad do uh like a cow's milk dairy products can you get can can some people get it if they're sensitive to it from a dairy product?
SPEAKER_05Dairy products bother me but let me tell you how they do it. And this is this was interesting because um you know most people who have alpha gal don't react badly to cheese. Really okay um but um you kind of steer away from cheese though don't you you know I I don't but I'm gonna start and I'll tell you why in just a second but um um it seems like dairy products could cause that if it's coming from a cow or here's where I'm milk or whatever. Here's where I found out that milk bothers me. Okay. You know I like to drink coffee but I normally put a non-dairy creamer in there. Um I might put a little half and half but it's a little teaspoon or something like that. So but rarely would I eat like morning cereal in the morning. But you know the kids might have some cereal in there. We may have some around every once in a while. Now this was years ago and I would eat the cereal and within an hour well within two or three hours I would get a red rash it was really just a line on my top edge of my top lip where that milk was hitting it. And it looked like I was wearing ladies lip liner. I mean it really did. And true story happened a bunch and it would burn and I would look at it in a magnified mirror and it's there's nothing on the surface but it looked like the pores had filled with blood but nothing came through on the surface so it wasn't like an abrasion it was just it just turned red and burned. And this happened I couldn't I didn't nail it down to the milk right at first but this happened because I didn't do it that much okay but about the fifth time it happened I noticed it was I'd eaten cereal that morning and um and it burned pretty good and it happened pretty quick this time. I mean I ate it and it happened pretty quick and I said there's something going on with that. And then when I found out I got alpha gal I said that's what's going on with that. And interestingly enough uh um when you exercise a lot if you get hot i you can itch and that happens to me if I uh if I'm if I'm like working out and um or playing golf and then go um you know pick your bag up or something and it goes up against your chest and throwing the thing where it rubbed up against you, I'll get a it almost looked like I get a a rash right there and that goes away pretty quickly.
SPEAKER_02You and you and I had the milk conversation. I don't remember what we were riding but you were you can't do milk. No well well you see and you gave me the analogies like uh you know cows do or you know that critters do it for a certain amount of time that's right and they're done. That's right. It ain't something you should be drinking as an adult. You were just wearing me out I was like I was taking it all out I don't drink milk anyway I didn't drink it when I was a kid.
SPEAKER_05Yeah I don't tell people milk is bad for them because it's not there's a lot of things in milk you can have that's good for you. I'm just all I said was we're the only species that drinks uh milk past infancy you know uh especially another uh another mammal's milk past infancy so I'm just I just said you don't have to have it. Now there's a lot of things good in it. Uh I got some buddies that are dairy farmers they're gonna come after me. I'm not telling you don't eat milk. I'm just telling you we don't have to have it.
SPEAKER_02You don't have to have it. Right right um I'm I've got a question here about reading labels but I'm gonna wait on that and get you to tell me about your uh uh the meal you ate the other night. You know you were telling me about the jambala we're gonna say we're gonna save that. All right all right now at this point is is uh is there a cure for alpha gal because they they're they're still just kind of sticking their toe in the water with Lyme disease and I hadn't seen anything about hey we can fix Alpha Gal. I don't I don't know that there's anything out there for it.
SPEAKER_05Um there is not a cure.
SPEAKER_02I'm not sure they're looking for one but we'll we'll get into that later.
SPEAKER_05Um but no there's not a cure um and is it a lifelong thing once you get it you get it um not necessarily okay um but there is no cure um I will tell you this um they've done studies on people who've got been diagnosed with alpha Gauss syndrome and um uh 12% of the people in the studies after five years of could they were able to reintroduce beef and mammalian products without any problems. Okay so 12% of them.
SPEAKER_02That's not many but that's no that's not many.
SPEAKER_05So there are some people who get better. You can get worse if you get new tick bites and I think that's happened to me. I think I keep recharging myself uh because I'm gonna bow hunt. New tick. Get another tick bite. New dose yeah and then you get a new a new dose of it you definitely can get w worse with new tick bites. But if you don't get new tick bites the alpha gal IgE titer decreases. Okay that's where they do the blood test and it decreases and you know 12% of the population according to studies in five years can reintroduce meat and be fine. Now um as far as uh cures I found out about this because I got multiple patients that have it and when they find out I have it they say have you tried this it fix meat really and acupuncture okay there is a particular acupuncture treatment called the Solomon auricular allergy treatment and it's emerged as a method for managing AGS. Now I've there's studies on this but I heard about it from my patients when we each find out we've got alpha gal but they take a single thin needle and they insert it into your ear at a specific point and they leave it in place for three weeks and it stimulates immune they said it stimulates immune response and reduces or clears AGS for many people. I got three patients who had that done and they're alpha gal they could eat meat. Now one guy did tell me um five years later no no yeah five years later his came back and he went and got it done again and it reduced it dramatically but didn't totally eliminate it. So there's something going on with that I don't know exactly what it is. That's fascinating. Otherwise the best way to fix it is don't don't eat the meat that you know don't eat the mammal beats that's that's causing you to have a reaction. One of my questions was can repeated tick bites bring that stuff back and you're convinced that it can just cause you have it. I have it and I've had it get worse and research backs that up that if you get bitten again and again your reaction can I guess be recharged or can make get worse.
SPEAKER_02All right tell me about why reading label if you got this and you've been diagnosed with it and you have a fairly severe reaction to it which you kind of do why is reading labels important? Tell me the story you told me on the golf course the other day.
SPEAKER_05Reading labels is very important. Because you do love to eat I know you do you do a good job of controlling it but reading labels is important for a lot of reasons but especially in Alpha Gal. My wife is a wonderful cook and uh she had made a new recipe for jambalaya and she used turkey sausage she was very aware of my allergy I bet and she really works hard to keep beef away from me and um she made turkey jambalaya which was delicious. It was fantastic it really was and um the next morning or that the next that night you know I got the reaction and uh got up the next morning and I told her I said baby I said there was some uh beef in that I said you sure you use turkey I said there was some beef in that I said I had a reaction last night and this morning and she goes no it was turkey and we were in the kitchen when I said it to her and she had the uh another package in the refrigerator and she goes see turkey sausage and she showed it to me I said I believe you I said but I had a reaction I got a hold of something and then the next week she made it again she goes I want to make this again my uh kids and grandkids were coming in the the following weekend she goes I want to perfect the recipe because I want to serve it to them I said great I said I hope it ain't no beef in that she almost got mad at me there's no beef in this I ate it bam same reaction two o'clock in the morning I had it again I got up the next morning I told her this baby there'd be beef in that she read the she's reading the ingredients off she read about four or five ingredients off the label see no beef turkey turkey turkey I said well it's in there somewhere I'm telling you it is and so the kids came in the next week and she made it for them and she put a big plate of it on the table for me I said I'm not eating that she goes what do you mean I said I'm not eating it there's some beef in there I said I'm not eating it and she goes it is not it's on the package it doesn't have it so my son-in-law picked it up Luke and Luke and he read the entire label and it was turkey turkey turkey turkey turkey there's about ten ingredients and the last ingredient on the thing was wrapped in a beef casing there you go and my wife just didn't go down that far she read you know three quarters of them and she like oh my gosh I'm so sorry I said you didn't know and I said but I knew that I had the reaction so I knew it was in there but yeah you got to read the labels and reading labels can get infuriating because there's a lot of things I get a bunch of low grade uh reactions you know protein bars yeah you know I'm a big protein guy and uh I'll eat protein bars for breakfast a lot of times and there are times when I itch at different times for no particular reason and I didn't really tie it to it completely but I am convinced now that that is having to do with eating protein bars that have whey protein. Whey is milk protein if you you read a label on anything processed and it's got casein in it which is a milk protein. Now these things don't really um may not cause you to react all the time it just depends on how much of that alphactose molecule is in these products. So there's not much in there you may not have reaction but but I can tell you there are times when I itch when I know I didn't eat beef that it's that. So I I've got to do a better job of that.
SPEAKER_02Well it's hard to read labels. Sometimes you can pick up something because you got me in that habit when I went through my spell with you and lost all that weight. And first off when you're my age you got to have your reading glasses and you got to have good light because they make the the it's so tiny. I was like I'm gonna take this over and get under the light and read it but it it's uh you it you gotta you kind of got to know what's in your food. From the bunkhouse XL to the lodge package Basecamp Home Series delivers modular high quality homes designed for outdoor enthusiasts large kitchens multiple bathrooms gear storage plus scenic outdoor living sections all customizable to your lifestyle it's comfort without boundaries visit basecamphomeseries.com for more information God bless America this is your spirit of the wild blood brother Ted Nugent and my family say Godspeed Mossy oak because our conservation lifestyle is a fist full of dirt God bless a fistful of dirt a 47 year old male who was an airline pilot with no previous medical history went camping during the summer of 2024 with his family and had a steak dinner late at night but woke up four hours later with severe abdominal pain vomiting and diarrhea that took two hours to resolve and he went back to sleep.
SPEAKER_10The next day he went hiking for five miles with his family and he had thought to himself that he thought he was going to die during those few hours it was that severe. Two weeks later while he's at a barbecue party near his home in New Jersey he eats a hamburger at 3 p.m and then about four and a half hours later develops similar symptoms but rapidly progresses towards becoming unconscious. They call 911 they have to do CPR and send him to the hospital and he passes away tragically two and a half hours later the autopsy report said that it was a sudden unexplained death that he had almost no alphanol in his system he had a little bit of Benadryl in his system but otherwise he was seemingly perfectly healthy. The family grief stricken had reached out to a friend who was a pediatrician who reviewed the autopsy report and after discussing with the widow they thought this could have potentially been one of these issues related to a meat allergy called AlphaGal syndrome. So they contacted one of the lead researchers at Alpha Syndrome at University of Virginia who did additional testing to confirm that yes, he actually had AlphaGal syndrome he died from anaphylactic shock. He had a tryptase level of over 2,000 which I've never seen a level that high before but that confirms that there was anaphylaxis occurring. So if you don't know what alpha gal syndrome is this may be the 10th most common food allergen in the United States we are seeing people who are getting bitten by this lone star tick called Amblioma americanum they get in their blood something called galactose alpha 13 galactose which is a large sugar molecule that when we get bit by that tick, the immune system creates an allergic response called sensitization that leads to AlphaGal syndrome where if you eat any mammalian products that contain four-legged animals like cow, venison, pork product, you could have a severe potentially life-threatening allergic reaction known as anaphylaxis. It doesn't always happen though it's not consistent and it can be delayed up to several hours which is not what we normally see with food allergies. And you have to treat this with epinephrine to protect against anaphylactic shock and having the blood pressure drop. Management is avoiding the potential triggers and avoiding tick bites. And this individual who tragically passed away was the first ever recorded case of fatal Alpha Gal syndrome he had been bitten by ticks in the past. And so I hope that this helps raise awareness because many physicians, healthcare workers and the general public don't know about AlphaGal syndrome. Please share this story widely I want to help raise awareness so that we can help prevent tragedies like this from happening again in the future.
SPEAKER_02Well you called it Laurreen you said that's going to be a long one he had
SPEAKER_04So many notes and we had so many questions. I was hoping we'd get two out of it.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, he is uh he is so smart. I made some posts on Instagram and the comments went nuts.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, people want to know about this.
SPEAKER_02And there's a lot of people that either have it or know somebody that has it.
SPEAKER_04Or want to prevent getting it if they can.
SPEAKER_02Unbelievable. You know, sometimes you just strike a nerve and that's good. Somebody said something to me about uh I was in the co-op, that's where it was. And they were talking about the podcast and there was an older guy in there. And he's like now, do do y'all uh do y'all do research and and pick all this stuff out? Do you have these things mapped out weeks? I said, No, it's just kind of whatever comes to mind. And uh you know, it's like I said, look, when Laurene tried to get me to do a podcast, first off, she said, You need one. I'm you remember what I said, I said What's a podcast?
SPEAKER_04What's a podcast?
SPEAKER_02And uh anyway, it's just like who knew? But I told him I I was talking to the older guy, and he's like, What else you talk about? I said, anything.
SPEAKER_04Anything.
SPEAKER_02I was one of the guys that runs that co-op. Matthew was standing there. I said, Matthew was on here. And he Matthew looked at him and said, Uh, you want my autograph? And I was like, I told him, I said, Look, everybody's got a story. You just need to pull it out of them. There's a lot of interesting stuff out there. And uh unless Lauren cracks a whip and gets me telling stories. Uh I don't like talking about myself, but every once in a while you hit on these topics that everybody wants to hear about. So we absolutely had an expert for that.
SPEAKER_04And summertime's kind of different too, because we can't talk about what we typically talk about, which are deer and turkeys and all that kind of like you know, you have to get more creative. And I know we've covered uh summer food plots already, and we need I think we need a hog episode actually following your Instagram. We need to do a hog episode.
SPEAKER_02Don't get me started because that's coming. But anyway, you predicted we would bust this into two episodes. Yes. So next week we're gonna finish up with Dr. David Allen talking about Alpha Gal, and I'll probably make another post or two, and I think I'm gonna save some of them comments because there's some people that it just really they either still have it or these are their symptoms, or I got over it, and I may read some of those. But anyway, big big thanks to you and David Allen, Dr. David Allen, my golfing buddy, and uh who happens to have Alpha Gal and does know what he he absolutely knows so much about it. So we will finish up next week with part two on Alpha Gal, especially as it relates to hunters. So for me and Laurene up in the Camo Cave, God bless every one of you.
SPEAKER_04We'll see you in seven days.
