Anybody else have trouble keeping the skin on their fingers and hands in the winter months? I Iose so many layers it gets down to raw skin on a couple of fingers where callous formed. The backs of both hands dry out and flake off and itch like crazy. Could be from past frostbite issues I’m not 100% sure.

Yesterday I turned a water valve and the thumb seam split open at the base of the finger at least it not the finger tip like a guy I knew has issues with. A little neosporin and a bandaid wrap gets me by for a while but I’ve never been a lotion guy.

Worked construction all my life and my fingers are constantly cracked and sore in the cold. Never cared much for wearing gloves even when water trapping. Just live with it.

When I’m trapping hard, I use udder butter cream to keep the skin on my hands from cracking. It works good.

Udder butter, Bag Balm, I've used with good results. Now I use Crack cream. Comes in a green jar. PPut it on just before bed every night for 3 or 4 days. Then you should be able to skip a few days. Then every other day put it on. My skin cracks real bad around my fingernails. Without putting something on it hurts just looking at them. Were all getting old and one has to take care of themself.

… OMG ! ….. prayers sent

I know you said you're not a lotion guy, but have you ever tried coon or bear grease? It helps me quite a bit.

This works for me

When I was able to trap, I worked in a powder metal brake plant!
The powdered meatal was filled into a cavity in the press ,and pressed into a solid casting to be fused to a brake plate. The furnace filled with stacks of then were heated to a high temperature to fuse them together.
The powered metal was mixed with fuel oil / kerosene is what it smelled like.
Any way, it would dry my hands out, along with wet hands while trapping.
I used corn huskers lotion back then.
Haven't had dry hands since I left that brake plant!
Yes my hands would bleed at times.

I use super glue on cracked fingers

Knew an old Bayman that couldn't keep skin on his hands, looked like a burn victim, it was some kind of skin disease.
He would put a prescription cream on, cotton gloves, and then rubber gloves to keep working....finally had to go on SS disability.

I'd use any of the creams mentioned and sleep with cotton gloves.... it couldn't hurt...

This is my go to for dry hands.
Dave

I use super glue when my skin cracks/splits and bleeds.

Then use lanolin based products when it's to late. Probably wouldn't have to much of a problem if I would use it to prevent my hands from cracking.

I haven't been impressed with that stuff. Almost any kind of hand lotion works better for me.

Mine get really bad too. It seems to me wearing gloves only makes it worse. Neosporin works about as well as anything. I tried that liquid skin repair(basically super glue) this year and thought at first it was going to be the ticket but it never let the cracks actually heal. Carmex or Burt’s bees lip balm works decently well also. You just have to keep applying it throughout the day. Never had muck luck with any of the lotions people recommended.

it works for me if I load it up thick right before bed.

Bag balm or this:

I work in dermatology and it looks like you might have a case of mild hand ecslzema which can happen as we age. If you cannot get over the counter creams and lotions to help repair the skin barrier there are pretty good prescriptions out of the market right now to treat thos kind of condition. Look up VTAMA, pretty good topical medication for getting rid of eczema and belong repair the skin barrier overall. Hope this helps bud!

That’s a come and goes thing it comes with a build up of calluses from fleshing, chainsaw usage, moving wood rounds so when I slow down or take a break the thick layers come off down to the red render skin. I wash my hand a lot this time of the year with lures, critters, dogs, chores and feeding the wood boiler everyday. I’d say maybe 2-3 times a year it’s not very often this occurs. The cracking is more of a winter thing it’s much more common in the cold months.

looks like dishydrotic eczema. Treatment is steroid cream. The kind you'd get from a doctor, not OTC