Ticks this year gonna be BAD.

unregistered168043 · #1 04/21/12, 09:21 AM

I'm up here in the Northeast where we hardly got a winter this year. I just stepped in the woods around my house for 2 minutes to look at a tree and stepped out with 8 ticks clinging to me and 6 or 7 on the dog!

Just pulled another one off as I'm writing this!! Changed my clothes and threw the others into a hot wash. Holy smokes, never seen it this bad here.

Tricky Grama · #2 04/21/12, 09:33 AM

Spray beneficial nematodes all around your place...prolly can't do it in the woods but at least you'll keep 'em away from your home. Powder yourself w/sulphur as soon as you walk out the door, they won't get on ya.

Rita · #3 04/21/12, 09:47 AM

When I was growing up in NE Pennsylvania in the forties, we never saw a tick. The first one I ever saw was when we moved to Maryland. I wonder what changed. We lived in Connecticut and never had them there and now that is the Lyme disease capitol.

Cliff · #4 04/21/12, 01:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tricky Grama

Spray beneficial nematodes all around your place...prolly can't do it in the woods but at least you'll keep 'em away from your home. Powder yourself w/sulphur as soon as you walk out the door, they won't get on ya.

I've been thinking about the sulfur. What kind and where do you buy it? Do yo just dust it on your feet and lower legs? Can you put it on dogs? I would think cats lick themselves too much for it to be safe on them.

rainy5 · #5 04/21/12, 07:18 PM

We had ticks nesting on a bush in our garden and we removed the bush after the ticks and bought french lavender plants and we have not had them anymore. We have a farm here in pa. That all they do is sell lavender it and the soap, teas, syrup etc.

barnyardgal · #6 04/21/12, 07:30 PM

I know the feeling all to well,last week while in the yard i got 6 off me in about an hour then after showering that night got 2 more off!! cannot let my chickens/guineas loose in the yard as they tear up mulch from my flower beds,might have to put fence back up around flower beds & turn chickens loose in the yard,ticks are really bad & summer not even here yet!!

tinknal · #7 04/21/12, 07:51 PM

Considering the winter we had and the weather we are having now I'm surprised how few ticks we have found this year.

salmonslayer · #8 04/21/12, 09:06 PM

We have so many here the local blood bank is crying foul.

unregistered168043 · #9 04/21/12, 09:18 PM

I got some front line today to dose my little buddy. He's gettin a tick bath tomorrow too whether he likes it or not!

Paquebot · #10 04/22/12, 03:17 AM

Some on HT don't like to see another tick thread but they haven't suffered the consequences. HT came into being at exactly the same time that I was the first Lyme's victim in several Wisconsin townships. It was the first case in our local medical care center and doctors got their first advice from me rather than medical journals. Everything was documented here and then lost! There were posts telling of the super morel harvest on Mother's Day 2002. A tick was discovered a week or so later "where the sun never shines" and a swelling about the size of a pigeon egg. Something was seriously wrong on Memorial Day two weeks after the super morel find. Several days later, my son stopped in to check on my deteriorating status. (He's an intensive-care hospital nurse.) After a few minutes of checking vital signs, he turned to my wife and said: "Your car or mine?" There was no question as to if I were going to be hospitalized but just how I was going to get there!

In the end, that tiny tick virtually took the legs out from under me and never returned to previous status. Those who do not have to deal with those ticks may pooh-pooh them as just a minor annoyance. For a disease which is seldom fatal, I'd gladly exchange it for whooping cough, measles, chicken pox, mumps, and all other childhood communicable diseases which were temporary stumbles in my life. They were merely a week or so of misery and then back to normal and lifetime immunity. Lyme's is permanent and there is no full recovery. My suffering from it coincided with the beginning of this forum. There is no doubt that the forum will outlive the consequences which will dictate the rest of my life. I'll go to my grave reminded of that one tick that I missed in the last place that I would have looked for it!

Martin

Tricky Grama · #11 04/22/12, 03:59 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cliff

I've been thinking about the sulfur. What kind and where do you buy it? Do yo just dust it on your feet and lower legs? Can you put it on dogs? I would think cats lick themselves too much for it to be safe on them.

Usually can get it at any feed store. Did buy it at Home Depot once.
Comes in granules too, good for spreading around an area where you may have lawn chairs, etc.
Put some in a sock & dust feet, legs, waist.
We put it on the dog but didn't seem to help much, maybe we didn't powder enuf.

So sorry, Martin to hear about your bout w/lime. Not an easy thing.

JasoninMN · #12 04/22/12, 09:13 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tinknal

Considering the winter we had and the weather we are having now I'm surprised how few ticks we have found this year.

I've noticed the same, very weird. Maybe the early dryness killed em off.

Maura · #13 04/22/12, 10:27 AM

have you considered chickens? We never saw a tick or flea when we had chickens. We now have fox who appreciate a chicken dinner, but if it's going to be bad this year, I'm making a chicken tractor and getting some tick eaters.

fishhead · #14 04/22/12, 03:07 PM

They all moved to Crow Wing County. We went for an 8 mile hike at the end of March and between the pup and I had at least 200 deer ticks. I got bit twice and he got bit more but he's got Frontline Plus and Vectra 3D plus I put a tick collar on him when we got home.

We just got back from another 8 mile hike and so far I've only picked a dozen or so. I'll be putting his collar on now. I should have done it when we started but I forgot.

Cheri in NY · #15 04/22/12, 06:11 PM

I was diagnosed with Lyme disease last September. I started having dizzy spells, then a fever which slowly went to 105 over a few days...this is high!! Then the tick site (but no visible tick) very red, circular, and about 6-8" across on my stomach. Achy arms and legs for maybe 2 weeks prior to the fever. At that high fever, hallucinations at night and hearing was affected. Doxycycline for 1 month. The rash from the bite took weeks to disappear. Very important to look at your entire body daily in the mirror, front and back, arms up (this can be scary). I started with Frontline Plus in February this year.

fishhead · #16 04/22/12, 06:16 PM

You put Frontline Plus on yourself?

Fat Charlie · #17 04/23/12, 01:47 PM

You can wear a flea collar around your ankle, but I don't recommend that.

The best sulfur supply is a book of matches. Eat a few match heads every few hours and your body will sweat out the sulfur. It tastes bad, but the bugs think so too.

Caz · #18 04/23/12, 02:04 PM

My daughter in the Army said that before they go on manuvers that they have to swallow a match head from a stick match for tick repellant. According to her it works. I'll try it one of these days.

Cheri in NY · #19 04/23/12, 06:25 PM

The Frontline Plus, of course goes on the cats and dogs, not on me!
But daily body inspections and showering helps to catch any ticks on us people.

Paquebot · #20 04/23/12, 10:06 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cheri in NY

But daily body inspections and showering helps to catch any ticks on us people.

It would have taken a proctologist to find the one that got me!

Martin