Ticks?

[imagineero]

and while we're this far off topic, here's some reading material on the problems associated with frontline/advantix. Insecticides are poison. Try some on yourself before your dog and see how you feel about it.

https://www.google.com.au/&sclient=psy-ab&q=advantix+dog+problem&oq=advantix+dog+problem&fp=facf0f7827145e9

https://www.google.com.au/&sclient=psy-ab&q=advantix+dog+problem&oq=advantix+dog+problem&fp=facf0f7827145e9

https://www.google.com.au/&sclient=psy-ab&q=advantix+dog+problem&oq=advantix+dog+problem&fp=facf0f7827145e9

Possible side effects include itching, hair loss, poor apetite, aggressive behaviour, neurological problems, cancer and death. On the positive side, it seems to annoy the ticks somewhat too. Welcome to arboristsite ;-)

Shaun

 

[Mad Professor]

I've been treated for Lyme several times. The last doctor gave me a renewable scrip for doxycycline.

Best defense is the mentioned permethrin products to treat your clothes, works wonderfully. I first tested it in a known tick infested area. A tick graqbbed my pant leg below the knee, it crawled about 4 inches then stopped, 30 sec latter it went into spasm and fell off.:hmm3grin2orange: DEAD. Never had a tick on me with treated clothes, treatment lasts 6 weeks/washings, whichever comes first.

They also have livestock sprays that can be used on dogs, but NOT cats.

Kitty and puppy will bring ticks into your home, even if YOu have not been outside. That is how I got bit the last 4 times.

If you don't treat your clothes , wash them after use , or tie them off in a bag until they can be laundered; I had a tick crawl onto me from dirty laundry next to my bed......

Regardless, check yourself if you have been out in tickland

 

[Mad Professor]

I've been treated for Lyme several times. The last doctor gave me a renewable scrip for doxycycline.

Best defense is the mentioned permethrin products to treat your clothes, works wonderfully. I first tested it in a known tick infested area. A tick graqbbed my pant leg below the knee, it crawled about 4 inches then stopped, 30 sec latter it went into spasm and fell off.:hmm3grin2orange: DEAD. Never had a tick on me with treated clothes, treatment lasts 6 weeks/washings, whichever comes first.

They also have livestock sprays that can be used on dogs, but NOT cats.

Kitty and puppy will bring ticks into your home, even if YOu have not been outside. That is how I got bit the last 4 times.

If you don't treat your clothes , wash them after use , or tie them off in a bag until they can be laundered; I had a tick crawl onto me from dirty laundry next to my bed......

Regardless, check yourself if you have been out in tickland

 

[Jules083]

I completely second the permethrin, it works great. Make sure you read the directions though, you can't just spray it on while walking out the door. I treated my clothes with it once before a 10 day field exercise in the Army, it was unreal the difference it made. Most guys were pulling off 5 to 10 ticks per day, sometimes dug in. I never had one the whole time. It made me a believer.

This is a bad year so far here. I probably found 5 or 6 crawling on me so far, and the girlfriend had 4 on her, all in the same day. One dug in her, none on me yet. I'm sure it's coming soon. I'm getting in the shower now though, you guys are making my skin crawl thinking about it.

 

[mountainmandan]

I saw a study done by a graduate student at Missouri State University to try to understand the prevalence of Lyme disease here in the Ozarks. He made a presentation to our microbiology class. The gist is he would drag a blanket through the weeds in hiking areas all over southwest Missouri to collect ticks. Then he would crush them and isolate spirochete DNA. Spirochete means spiral shaped bacteria. He found up to 3% of ticks had spirochete DNA in them. There are two tick born spirochete illnesses, Lyme and STARI (southern tick associated rash infection). Stari is more likely to have an recognizable acute phase such as rash and flue like symptoms, but less likely to go dormant and then cause encephalopathies. (holes or spongy areas in your brain) The acute phase of Lyme disease and stari is very easy to treat, but after they enter your central nervous system and start destroying tissue, it is much harder to treat. It is hard to get common antibiotics to cross the blood brain barrier in any therapeutic amounts.

The quite common occurrence of the infectious spirochete in our ticks tells me that even if you are bitten by an infected tick, you probably won't be infected. Otherwise these diseases would be much more prevalent. One of the benefits of this research is they are working on a more reliable test for Lyme disease, the current tests are not very accurate.

I know we overuse antibiotics in this country, but in this case using antibiotics in suspected cases seems warranted since tests are not very accurate. Don't live in fear of ticks, but if you are sick and don't know why, take it serious.

I get bit all of the time, and my kids do too. We love the Ozarks and love the woods, so it is just part of it.

Thanks
Dan

 

[zogger]

I saw a study done by a graduate student at Missouri State University to try to understand the prevalence of Lyme disease here in the Ozarks. He made a presentation to our microbiology class. The gist is he would drag a blanket through the weeds in hiking areas all over southwest Missouri to collect ticks. Then he would crush them and isolate spirochete DNA. Spirochete means spiral shaped bacteria. He found up to 3% of ticks had spirochete DNA in them. There are two tick born spirochete illnesses, Lyme and STARI (southern tick associated rash infection). Stari is more likely to have an recognizable acute phase such as rash and flue like symptoms, but less likely to go dormant and then cause encephalopathies. (holes or spongy areas in your brain) The acute phase of Lyme disease and stari is very easy to treat, but after they enter your central nervous system and start destroying tissue, it is much harder to treat. It is hard to get common antibiotics to cross the blood brain barrier in any therapeutic amounts.

The quite common occurrence of the infectious spirochete in our ticks tells me that even if you are bitten by an infected tick, you probably won't be infected. Otherwise these diseases would be much more prevalent. One of the benefits of this research is they are working on a more reliable test for Lyme disease, the current tests are not very accurate.

I know we overuse antibiotics in this country, but in this case using antibiotics in suspected cases seems warranted since tests are not very accurate. Don't live in fear of ticks, but if you are sick and don't know why, take it serious.

I get bit all of the time, and my kids do too. We love the Ozarks and love the woods, so it is just part of it.

Thanks
Dan

Good post!

 

[saw dog]

I have Lyme and have been treated for it for years. If it goes undiagnosed to long it is allmost impossible to get rid of. the lume bacteria has the ability to incapulate its self in a proten it produces when antibotics are introduced to it. When you quit taking the meds it emerges from captulation and continues to tear your body down. If you see a bulls eye do not allow your doctor to wait for test results demand that he starts treatment on the spot and 40 days of Doxy, is what it take if caught in the first stage. I can,t tell you how deabiliting Lyme is, It has made my life miserable. It is very very cripiling and painfull. Stonybrook University in Stonybrook N.Y. is the best place to send labs for Lyme detection. They are the ones that origionaly isolated the Lyme bateria and are the most accurate lab I know of. It is easy to get a faulse possitive or a faulse negitive if the right median is not use in testing.

 

[zogger]

I have Lyme and have been treated for it for years. If it goes undiagnosed to long it is allmost impossible to get rid of. the lume bacteria has the ability to incapulate its self in a proten it produces when antibotics are introduced to it. When you quit taking the meds it emerges from captulation and continues to tear your body down. If you see a bulls eye do not allow your doctor to wait for test results demand that he starts treatment on the spot and 40 days of Doxy, is what it take if caught in the first stage. I can,t tell you how deabiliting Lyme is, It has made my life miserable. It is very very cripiling and painfull. Stonybrook University in Stonybrook N.Y. is the best place to send labs for Lyme detection. They are the ones that origionaly isolated the Lyme bateria and are the most accurate lab I know of. It is easy to get a faulse possitive or a faulse negitive if the right median is not use in testing.

That just sucks man, thanks for sharing the importance of this stuff. I certainly hope they can come up with a real total cure for you and other folks.

 

[Chris-PA]

Otherwise these diseases would be much more prevalent

In these areas it is quite prevalent. If you except the people who live in towns, never leave facebook to go outside, etc., quite a few have it. I would like to have the numbers, but even that will be skewed by the very poor rate of diagnosis. I know many who quite obviously have it, including young people, but who are trapped in an endlessly escalating spiral of mis-diagnosis, while their condition worsens and the doctors make more guesses and do more extreme tests and treatments. I don't understand why Lyme disease, which has a known cause, is such a political hot button in the medical community. Some of that is due to the lousy tests and the idea that if you throw people on a week of antibiotics then you've eliminated it.

Anyway, if you are going to spend time in the woods then when it comes to Lyme you'd better be knowledgeable and be prepared to be your own advocate. Do NOT just accept what the system gives you.

Last, there are two other tick-borne illnesses to be aware of, Babesia and Bartonella (cat scratch fever). My kids have had both. as well as Lyme.

 

[mountainmandan]

yes Wood heat warrior, the northeast has much higher infection rates than the rest of the country.

Dan

 

[rob066]

I cut a few trees last week and had A tick crawling up my arm. But I didnt really check myself over for others. One was imbedded in my arm pit. What a pain to get out. It was one of the deep boring lonestar ticks.

 

[husky455rancher]

i got lyme disease a few years back. i took the meds till they were gone. that was about it. i havent taken anything since for it.

 

[Currently]

Thanks for that cedarcide tip, I am going to give that a try.

My brother has a wood shop and de-fleas his cat with cedar shavings. My mother used cedar blocks to protect woolens from moth damage.

 

[thepheniox]

So I've decided the best idea would be to stay away from known tick areas. So I've stayed away for over a week now and I just found one dug into the dog. Great!

 

[Whiteash]

So I've decided the best idea would be to stay away from known tick areas. So I've stayed away for over a week now and I just found one dug into the dog. Great!

I try my best too.. I got one IN TOWN. Deer tick, bulls eye 4 days later. I'm on day five of 10 days of doxycyclene. Great stuff that doxycyclene

 

[Stihl Wielder]

My youngest son got one on his foot over Memorial Day weekend, they were swimming and playing in the yard (lawn grass, not tall grass). He came up to me in the evening and said he had a bug on the top of his foot. I almost needed a magnifying glass to see it, it was so small! It must have just got started boring into his skin because it came right out with ease, didn't break the head off. We kept it in a ziploc bag with rubbing alcohol in it in case he gets a rash or gets sick. So far he is fine. This past winter during a scouting trip for deer the weekend before deer season I had around 40 ticks on me, YES 40!! None burrowed in, they were all on my outer garments. I did some research on Permethrin, and ended up buying some Total Lawn Bug Killer (by Cutter brand) at Lowes, It contains Permethrin. I watered it down (putting a 1/4 cup in a spray bottle and mixing it with water), sprayed my outer garments ONLY (nothing that would be touching my skin), and that stuff works like a charm. I went deer hunting the whole season and when a tick would start walking on my clothes, within an inch or two he would fall off DEAD. I am a firm believer in the Permethrin. As for ticks (as well as all the different borers that kill trees, all the ants, all the mosquitoes, all the gypsy moths and tent caterpillars, etc.) until they start spraying to kill them off, it is gonna get worse and worse every year. That is a fact. Bugs have gone out of control (mainly the invasive species), and there is nothing being done to get rid of them. When I was a kid, we would go out in the woods winter, spring, summer, and fall and never EVER get a tick......NEVER. Now you can't even go into your backyard without having to worry about them.:msp_sad:

 

[Chris-PA]

When I was a kid in the 70's we used to get dog ticks fairly often - we'd just pop 'em off. My sister did get Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever once.

 

[ppkgmsy]

We've got a lot of ticks in VT. Seems like every year there are more. I've already had a couple on me this year. No Lyme in our family, thank goodness, but we know a number of people who have suffered. After a day in the woods, I make a point of showering and trying to search around for the little critters. Usually I find them while in the shower but sometimes I'll feel an itch later and discover one still on me. I used to pull them out with tweezers but this can be difficult if they are deep in the skin. In addition, if I understand correctly, when they struggle or their body is damaged they can shed bacteria into the host's bloodstream. My wife bought us a small tick remover whereby we hook the beast and then twist him off in one piece. It's been very effective.

 

[ppkgmsy]

My wife got an school email on tick removal today. Dab a liberal amount of liquid soap on a cotton ball, rub it on the tick for fifteen to twenty seconds and the tick will come out and stick to the cotton ball. I had one on the back of my head where I could not see it. My daughter pulled it out. Using this method I could have done it myself without the risk of leaving the head buried in the skin.

Thanks for the tip. I'm going to give it a try.

 

[wagz]

good scientific reading here:

CDC - Lyme Disease Home Page