In his book "Sting of the Wild," entomologist, insect sting connoisseur and creator of theSchmidt sting pain index, Justin Schmidt has this to say about the sting of the bullet ant:
"Paraponera昆虫明星的故事值得告诉one's grandchildren.... If stung, you might not think you will live to see grandchildren, but, rest assured, no one has ever died from bullet ant stings."
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Schmidt has spent his career cataloging how differentinsect stings给人感觉被蛰,不得不挖deep to find proper analogies for each, in addition to rating the pain on a four point scale. As you'd imagine most of the world's insects rate lower on the pain scale, but Schmidt has given three special bugs a four-star rating for pain: thetarantula hawk(Pepsis grossa), the warrior wasp (Synoeca septentrionalis) and the bullet ant (Paraponera clavata).
Of the bullet ant sting, Schmidt rhapsodizes in his sting pain index: "Pure, intense, brilliant pain. Like walking over flaming charcoal with a 3-inch [7.6-centimeter] nail in your heel."
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