Deer ticks

[bandmiller2]

How do you guys that spend alot of time working in the woods and brush deal with deer ticks?? Frank C.

[WDH]

Poorly  .

I hate the permanone spray, so I almost never use it.  Wear long sleeves if you can stand it.  Keep your shirt tucked in good.  Wear socks that you can pull up over your pants legs at the ankle.  Wear light clothes.  One reason that foresters wear khakis pants is that you can see the ticks when they get on your pants.  You cannot do this with normal blue jeans, so get some pants that will allow you to see ticks if they attach to your pants.

Here is the most important thing.  Check yourself everyday at the end of the day.  This means get naked.  A partner helps to check out the hard to see places, but this could be a dangerous practice, and it could increase the size of your family   :.

[Tom]

I did the same as WDH, but I put tape around my ankles also.   I sprayed my ankles(top of boots), waist-band, wrists and neck with DEET and got myself checked real close when I got home.  Getting your spouse in the shower can make for an exciting end to an all-work day.

I've been told that DEET doesn't repel ticks, but I did it anyway.  I think it works.

[WDH]

What, the DEET or the shower?  :D

[Tom]

The Shower!!   I use the Deet excuse to stay in the shower.  ;D

[jander3]

Permanone...always.  Tick borne illness just about killed me in 07.   A month off work followed by a week in the Mayo Clinic.   I found religion...Permanone spray and check carefully.

[whiskers]

My neighbor keeps guinea fowl and says they smack um right up.

[sigidi]

Down here we get cattle tick which isn't bad, but we get paralysis tick and 1 tick would make an average fella of 100kg a bit sick, but 2 would have 'em layed up in hospital. I've been lucky not to have any bother me, but I still make sure i get a real close inspection when I come home ;D :D ;)

[VT-Woodchuck]

Recent turkey hunting excursion resulted in two turkeys and three ticks. Luckily, the ticks were on another guy! And the turkeys were bigger.  :D

[thecfarm]

Permanone,I will have to find some of that stuff.Is that a brand name or an ingredient? We never had many ticks of any kind in my area up until last year.We found a few on us last year.I take better care of my dog than I do myself. I'm outside most of the day.Trees and fields every wheres I go really.We found more ticks on the dog this year than we ever have.Should of started his treatment in Feb this year.

[bandmiller2]

Went bird hunting one november morning ,their was a good hard white frost,picked 23 deer ticks off my pants.Their tough little blighters you can even get them during warm spells in the winter.Frank C.

[Chuck White]

Sometimes people get Deer Ticks confused with Deer Lice.

At least around here anyways.

A tick (of any kind) has 8 legs and a louse has 6.

The ones we see on the deer we get during hunting season are lice, I've never seen a tick on a deer!

[bandmiller2]

Chuck, do deer lice carry Lyme disease?? Frank C.

[bandmiller2]

I have a small device that looks like a ball point pen for removing ticks it has a fine loop that extends when you press the back of the "pen" loop that around the little booger and with a slight twist out he comes head and all.Bought it at the vets office.Frank C.

[Chuck White]

BM2
I've never heard of Deer Lice carrying Lyme Disease!
But that doesn't mean they can't.
Probably a question to ask medical personnel or an Entemologist.

As far as I know Deer Lice do not penetrate the skin, they just try to stay where it's warm.
Deer Lice also fly.  I don't know if Ticks do or not!

That Tick removal tool you acquired sounds like it would be painful to use, but it should get the job done!

[bandmiller2]

Chuck,the tool is painfull to the tick but not to the user.Its secret is the loop gets between the tick and your skin and removes the head.Worst thing you can do is grab mr tick with tweezers it squeezes juce into the bite and usally the head breaks off.Frank C.

[Magicman]

That Tick removal tool you acquired sounds like it would be painful to use, but it should get the job done!

It don't matter if it hurts the tick.....

[Chuck White]

That Tick removal tool you acquired sounds like it would be painful to use, but it should get the job done!

It don't matter if it hurts the tick.....

;D :D ;D :D ;D :D

[SwampDonkey]

How do you guys that spend alot of time working in the woods and brush deal with deer ticks?? Frank C.

Don't have none, just flies. ;D

[bandmiller2]

Swamper your lucky on the ticks, but those blackflies are no bargan.At least we don't have chiggers.Frank C.

[jander3]

Repel Permonone

http://www.drugstore.com/products/prod.asp?pid=153116&catid=10539

There are other tick-borne illness in addition to Lymes disease (i.e. Anaplasmosis and Babesios). Speaking from personal experience, it also possible to get all three at one time, a situation that I  highly recommend avoiding. I never did find a tick or bite or mark, not sure how I missed it as the *DanG tick that got me must have been the size of a small dog.

The internal medicine doc at the Mayo clinic mentioned that the symptoms for Babesios were very similar to Malaria. Never had Malaria; after living through Babesios, I've added Malaria to my list of things that I really should avoid.

The purpose for all this detail, that most probably don't care about, is that over a month and number of trips to the emergency room I was diagnosed and treated for Lymes disease (3 times).  However, the local doctors never looked for the others. Wasn't till the Mayo guys got a hold of me after 102-104 degree fever every night for  a month that they figured it out.  When I finally went to the Mayo Clinic, it took them like one hour to figure out the problem.

[ljmathias]

Jander (and why the "3"?): Sounds like you're lucky to be alive!

Worst I ever had, I was at a resort in Arkansas (no reflection on our members) and took two grandkids for a canoe ride out to a little island in their lake.  Didn't take 10 steps before we were all covered foot to hip with ticks!   >:(  Scariest encounter with bugs I've ever had.  We all swatted them off, jumped back in the canoe and all the way back to the lodge, searched for ticks.  Immediately went swimming (which allowed a careful naked check before-  more hitchhikers found not yet bit in) and then showered with lots of shampoo and soap, followed by another full body check.  Lyme disease was real bad that year and we were all scared but escaped with our bodies intact.

Lj

[Holmes]

ljmathias   That happened to me on Cape Cod .We walked thru some waist high grass and ended up with about 100 ticks on us . We ran out of there, did a tick check on our close , jumped into the car and went back to the hotel, for additional tick checks. My wife was creaped out by the experience and did not even want those clothes in the car. Holmes

[SwampDonkey]

Western Nova Scotia woods were bad for wood ticks, worst critters I seen. I'll take the black flies and squeeters over those things.  ;D I did pick up a couple ticks off a dead moose carcass. I thought dead animals meant the end of the parasite on them, apparently not.

[bandmiller2]

These DanG deer ticks seem to be a new thing, growing up all we had were common dog ticks just pull them off no big deal.Bambi in the freezer dosen't host ticks.I'am told theirs a mouse in the life cycle of the deer tick.I used to spend early fall roaming around the marshes of Cape Cod chaseing rail birds quit that lately.Frank C.