Dendrocnide moroides, commonly known in Australia as the stinging tree, stinging bush, or gympie-gympie, is a plant in the nettle family Urticaceae found in rainforest areas of Malesia and Australia. It is notorious for its extremely painful and long-lasting sting.
Known as Gympie-gympie in Australia and salat in Papua New Guinea, contact with this leaf can result in human death, more often extreme pain that can last for months. Stinging hairs deliver a potent neurotoxin when touched.
The sting lasts as long as the hairs remain below your skin; until your body physically forces them out. The pain from broken hairs can last for days to months. Photo of a gympie-gympie plant.
Although called a tree, the Gympie-Gympie is a soft-wooded shrub that can reach 4-5m, but is often found as a smaller shrub around 0.1-1m tall. Small plants earn the appropriate name of 'ankle biters', as the unwary traveller brushes against them.
Common thornapple is an annual plant with large, trumpet-shaped flowers and spiny fruit. The whole plant is poisonous to people, pets and livestock.
These include the nocturnal leaf-eating chrysomelid beetle and even a small marsupial known as the red-legged pademelon. Humans can eat the juicy fruit of the gympie-gympie, but only if they have taken the time to properly and painstakingly remove every one of its hairs.
The most painful
Another common introduced stinger in Australia is the European wasp, Vespula germanica. This wasp's sting doesn't get stuck in our skin, so they can inflict multiple stings when annoyed or provoked.
Known colloquially as the gympie gympie (from the Gubbi Gubbi/ Kabi Kabi name for the plant, gimpi gimpi), gympie stinger, and giant stinging tree (D. excelsa), this plant has the dubious honour of being arguably the most painful plant in the world.
One of the world's most venomous plants, the Gympie-Gympie stinging tree can cause months of excruciating pain for unsuspecting humans.
Gympie Gympie
Even the lightest touch can leave victims suffering for weeks, if not months at a time. Infamously known as the most venomous plant in Australia, contact with Gympie Gympie will cause immediate and severe burning that intensifies in just 20 to 30 minutes.
Nettles are plants with sharp hairs on their leaves. If you touch them, these hairs inject irritants into the skin, making it itchy, red and swollen.
Native to tropical Australia, heart-leaf poison bush is a woody perennial shrub. It is found from Western Australia's Hamersley Range through the Northern Territory to Cape York Peninsula and Queensland's central highlands. Heart-leaf poison bush is poisonous to stock, requiring pastures with this plant to be fenced.
The two species are similar, but can be distinguished by the leaf stalk, which is attached at the margin of the leaf in giant stinging tree (Dendrocnide excelsa), while in the stinging tree or Gimpie-gimpie (Dendrocnide moroides), the leaf stalk is attached some distance from the margin.
Don't let this seemingly tame moniker fool you – the castor oil plant, or Ricinus communis, once held the Guinness Book of World Records title for World's Most Poisonous Plant. Unsurprisingly, it's also known to be one of the most poisonous plants for children, and its leaves can be spotted in all states of Australia.
In south-east Queensland (SEQ) three species of stinging tree can be found: Giant Stinging Tree (Dendrocnide excelsa); Shiny-leaved Stinging Tree (D. photinophylla); and, Gympie Stinger or Gympie-Gympie (D. moroides).
A stinging nettle sting can feel like a bee sting: sharp, sudden, and very painful. It's almost an instinct to look for a bee or stinging ant as the culprit rather than the tall straggly plants along a trail or weeds in a garden. Even a small nettle plant only a few inches tall can deliver a nasty sting.
Pain Level 4 is the highest level in the Schmidt sting pain index. Schmidt's original index rated only one such example, the sting of the bullet ant, as a 4. Schmidt described the sting as "pure, intense, brilliant pain...
Deadly Nightshade (Atropa belladonna)
Nightshade contains atropine and scopolamine in its stems, leaves, berries, and roots, and causes paralysis in the involuntary muscles of the body, including the heart. Even physical contact with the leaves may cause skin irritation.
Though Australian Paper wasps are not as outwardly aggressive as European wasps, they will likely swarm and sting any threats to their nest. Their stings can cause symptoms ranging from pain and itching to severe allergic reactions (anaphylaxis).
The tarantula hawk has been awarded second place on the Schmidt's sting pain index, beaten only by the South American bullet ant, Paraponera clavata.
Bullet ant
Last but not least, we have the most painful sting of all — the bullet ant sting. Schmidt describes the pain as “pure, intense, brilliant pain. Like walking over flaming charcoal with a three-inch nail embedded in your heel” and rates it as a 4.0+…off-the-charts pain that lasts up to 24 hours.
Distribution. From north Queensland, where it is fairly common, south to the Clarence River in north-east NSW. It is very rare in the southern-most part of its range.
The round knobbly fruit, usually reaching 3.5-4 cm in diameter have a distinctive and recognisably citrus flavour, with a similar globular texture to the more commonly known Finger Lime. Also known as Dooja or Gympie lime.
Cooking or drying neutralises the toxic components, and nettles can be used as a tea or in soup, blanched for a salad or even added to pizza. Nettles are high in nutrients such iron, magnesium and nitrogen. If you get them out before they set seed they can be added to compost or dug in as a green manure crop.