Who knows anything about ticks?

woodstock

woodstock

Final Approach
Joined
Feb 23, 2005
Messages
9,342
Location
Out of a suitcase
Display Name
Display name:
iTravel
ugh ugh ugh

I went for a walk tonight - totally paved paths but part of my walk takes me through woods for about 10 minutes. Due to the fact that all of my medical issues can be traced to a tick, I'm ultra careful. I don't walk in tall grass, etc.

When I got back into the house, I felt something brush my neck. I put my hand up reflexively and caught whatever it was. I think it was a tick.

My speculation is that he fell on my shirt and eventually crawled up to my neck and didn't have a chance to latch. I hope so anyway. Do those bastards wait in trees or something? I wasn't in grass, at all. In fact the only time I was near lawn at all today was at lunch time.

Does anyone happen to know if you find a tick free-crawling, not embedded, if the odds are that you haven't been bitten yet? I thought once those buggers bit, they were IN THERE and good luck getting them out. I inspected myself thoroughly after I got rid of that one and didn't find any others...

I'm understandbably a little freaked out. The chain of events that led to my eye surgery this week were all tick related...

where is DEET when you need it? :mad2:

ps. it wasn't engorged, either.
 
You're good. Still crawling -- not bitten yet. Not to worry.
 
Whew. thanks.

I guess I'm going to have to avoid that wooded path during the summer time. Bummer, it's a nice walk. I don't know how else it would have come near me. I avoid tall grass like the plague.
 
DEET for exposed skin, Permethrin for clothing (Spray it and then put it in a trash bag the day before)

I've been in tick central many a time, never been bit and rarely have found ticks on me while others have them all over.
 
Thanks Dan and everyone. I'll have to go take a look for DEET. I imagine though if I avoid this wooded part on my daily walk, I don't need DEET for the walks - IE leave it for hiking?
 
It takes around 12 hours for ticks to attached themselves. After your walk just hit the shower and check your hairline. I live in tick country also and it is not unusual for me to find 2-3 ticks on me (crawling) after an outing in the woods mushroom hunting. It's just a ritual you have to go through.

Sorry to hear about your heath problems due to ticks. It there any chance you have a good immunity to tick bites now?
 
Hey woodstock.....if you live in the hudson valley...you should know....

Tick capitial of the world..!~
 
woodstock said:
Thanks Dan and everyone. I'll have to go take a look for DEET. I imagine though if I avoid this wooded part on my daily walk, I don't need DEET for the walks - IE leave it for hiking?
Click to expand...

You're welcomes, though tick eradication should be a National Priority. That and mosquitoes. And black flies. And horse flies. And deer flies. And house flies. :mad3:


You can find 100% DEET in outdoor stores, but quite frankly it burns my skin. So I dab the 100% stuff on collars and socks (if wearing shorts) and use the 60% stuff for exposed skin. The only time I go through all this trouble is hikes along unimproved trails (or when doing Army stuff, but that's no longer on my agenda :smile:)
 
You'll notice that this is a pretty classy group. Not a single one of them offered to come assist with a thorough examination to help "check for ticks." :rofl:

woodstock said:
Whew. thanks.

I guess I'm going to have to avoid that wooded path during the summer time. Bummer, it's a nice walk. I don't know how else it would have come near me. I avoid tall grass like the plague.
Click to expand...
 
woodstock said:
Do those bastards wait in trees or something? I wasn't in grass, at all. In fact the only time I was near lawn at all today was at lunch time.
Click to expand...

Ticks love shrubs with lots of leaf litter or mulch on the ground. The undergrowth that you commonly see in the forests around the DC area is just heaven to them - especially when there are plenty of deer or other host animals to keep the tick population going. Suburban plantings of azeleas, boxwoods, and other shrubs can be tick spots, too, if there's some nice mulch underneath. That's usually a problem in early spring before the gardners get out there with all the chemicals. Ticks don't mess with trees much - too high to climb off on a passing animal. According to the internet you can find them in tall grass. I guess that makes some kind of sense but you couldn't prove it by me. I've never even heard of a tick in a kempt lawn, although I suppose there's always a first time.

+1 to "if they're still crawling around they haven't bitten yet".
 
woodstock said:
Thanks Dan and everyone. I'll have to go take a look for DEET. I imagine though if I avoid this wooded part on my daily walk, I don't need DEET for the walks - IE leave it for hiking?
Click to expand...
One brand is Muskol, formulated by Schering Plough (I guess that's Merck now?). I used to work at SP and got the stuff at an employee discount- I was amazed how well it worked; a little goes a long way. I still have some.

As for daily walks- maybe there are no ticks, maybe there are. We got a house in southern NJ and I wound up dusting the yard because I would get ticks from cutting the grass- we had no brush in the yard. It was new construction so maybe the ticks hadn't moved out yet.
 
dmccormack said:
Actually, that would be Fort Pickett, VA.
Click to expand...
I thought it was central Wisconsin. One of my flying buddies and I went for a hike, actually it was more like bushwhacking, and when we got back in the car we could feel things moving around under our clothes. I think we each found about 20. Being from Colorado neither one of us even thought about the possibility of ticks.
 
gah! creepy crawly stories! freaks me out.

Yes, I am blind in one eye, and have had 4 invasive surgeries and one laser surgery due to the effects of many years of being afflicted without knowing what it was.

I'll print this out and take it shopping. I imagine REI would sell the stuff.
 
woodstock said:
Thanks Dan and everyone. I'll have to go take a look for DEET. I imagine though if I avoid this wooded part on my daily walk, I don't need DEET for the walks - IE leave it for hiking?
Click to expand...

Deep Woods Off works well. It's about 30% DEET.

You don't need to go to REI.

I'd use it on walks even outside of the woods. Ticks can get on you from grass, mulch, leaves, even some pets.

I'd also tuck my pants legs into my socks and wear a hat on hiking excursions.

Only time I needed to use 100% DEET was when I went to Egypt. Wanted to be extra sure to ward off the skeeters there. Had malaria pills along, too, just in case. Seems to me that I bought the 100% DEET from one of the outfitters (HTO, maybe), though REI ought to carry it. You might even find it at LL Bean in Tyson's.

But 100% is probably overkill - it can be harsh on skin & is pretty expensive.
 
If you get a big red bull's-eye somewhere in a day or two and find a bite in the middle around the bite sight, you got trouble (Lyme disease, no big deal if caught right away). Otherwise, don't worry about it unless you pick at the bite and it gets infected.
 
wsuffa said:
Deep Woods Off works well. It's about 30% DEET.

<SNIP>
But 100% is probably overkill - it can be harsh on skin & is pretty expensive.
Click to expand...
It is expensive...but it goes a long way. I would spray it into my hands (one squirt) and just rub my hands everywhere. The bugs just went away. A dab will do you.

I never ran out of the 100% stuff- I lost the bottle someplace in India after about 10 years. I have to make do with the 30% Muskol I still have.
 
woodstock said:
gah! creepy crawly stories! freaks me out.

Yes, I am blind in one eye, and have had 4 invasive surgeries and one laser surgery due to the effects of many years of being afflicted without knowing what it was.

I'll print this out and take it shopping. I imagine REI would sell the stuff.
Click to expand...

Yeah. Jungle Juice at REI, but it might make your skin red. I'm using Deep Woods Off! Sportsman Active whatever.

We got the aggressive "flood mosquitoes" back and some gnats that are driving us nuts in the daytime. I did run with the heavy artillery insect fogger.

Why isn't there a human version of K9 Advantix? It kills and repels ticks and mosquitos for a month with one treatment. http://k9advantix.petparents.com/howItWorks.cfm Only one dog didn't like it for a few minutes after it was applied.
 
Muskol used to be something like 97% DEET. I would always use a thin layer of it on exposed skin for hikes out in the Michigan deep woods. I agree, you don't need much of it. It's so thin and runny that I think I lost more to leakage through the cap than I ever put on me. I wish you could still buy it, not so much for ticks as for Michigan mosquitoes. Deep Woods Off works too, but you do need more of it and have to reapply it ever couple of hours or so. The old Muskol would take many hours of sweating to wear off.
 
woodstock said:
I thought once those buggers bit, they were IN THERE and good luck getting them out.
Click to expand...
They aren't really that hard to remove - even if they've been in there for days. Take a pair of twezers - grab them at teh base of your skin and pull them straight off.

I've had many of them in my life - almost always find one or two at Gastons attached. Bastards.
 
azure said:
Muskol used to be something like 97% DEET. I would always use a thin layer of it on exposed skin for hikes out in the Michigan deep woods. I agree, you don't need much of it. It's so thin and runny that I think I lost more to leakage through the cap than I ever put on me. I wish you could still buy it, not so much for ticks as for Michigan mosquitoes. Deep Woods Off works too, but you do need more of it and have to reapply it ever couple of hours or so. The old Muskol would take many hours of sweating to wear off.
Click to expand...
You can still buy 100% DEET, althought not Muskol. If it's 100%, no additives, then the brand doesn't really matter anymore. I sold my Schering Plough stock before it tanked.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=100%+DEET&aq=f&aqi=g10&aql=&oq=&gs_rfai=
 
Cap'n Jack said:
You can still buy 100% DEET, althought not Muskol. If it's 100%, no additives, then the brand doesn't really matter anymore. I sold my Schering Plough stock before it tanked.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=100%+DEET&aq=f&aqi=g10&aql=&oq=&gs_rfai=
Click to expand...
<slaps forehead> Doh! I've even used Ben's, after Muskol stopped producing the good stuff. I didn't know it was still available though. Repel used to be a competitor of Muskol, then they stopped selling it too. I assumed it was because of skin irritation and we'd never see it again, but I guess I was wrong.
 
Frequent checks are still important, even when using DEET or other repellents. I've been traipsing through the woods for more than 40 years, and as a child I learned the importance of outdoor companions checking each other for ticks. It's not a matter of "class." It's just common sense. It even stopped being embarrassing a long time ago.

As far as the ticks themselves, American dog ticks and deer ticks are the ones to worry about. Brown dog ticks very rarely transmit human diseases. American Dog Ticks can transmit Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever, and deer ticks often carry the bacterium that causes Lyme Disease.

In most places, deer ticks are the major concern, both because their small size makes them harder to find on your body, and because they're associated with Lyme Disease. Repellents containing DEET are only moderately effective at lower doses, and the 100 percent DEET is very irritating to many people, among other toxicology concerns. Permethrin can also be irritating if sprayed on close-fitting clothing, like socks for example.

What I usually do is treat the outside of my shoes and clothing with permethrin, which is pretty simple to do: Just spray the outsides rather than the insides. I also use 100% DEET, which doesn't happen to irritate me like permethrin does. But my companions and I also examine each other, and yes, we sometimes do find ticks, despite the chemical repellents.

One of my hiking companions swears that garlic oil supplements (the smelly, soft gel kind) will keep ticks away. I personally doubt it, but I also don't recall ever finding a tick on her. So who knows... maybe she's right.

-Rich
 
Did you buy Tom's airplane?

azure said:
<slaps forehead> Doh! I've even used Ben's, after Muskol stopped producing the good stuff. I didn't know it was still available though. Repel used to be a competitor of Muskol, then they stopped selling it too. I assumed it was because of skin irritation and we'd never see it again, but I guess I was wrong.
Click to expand...
 
RJM62 said:
One of my hiking companions swears that garlic oil supplements (the smelly, soft gel kind) will keep ticks away. I personally doubt it, but I also don't recall ever finding a tick on her. So who knows... maybe she's right.

-Rich
Click to expand...


Garlic and lots of B vitamins have been promoted as pest repellents.

I think blood type has more to do with how many creepies get you than any other factor.
 
Dad was a USDA guy who oversaw dam-building projects in western OK when I was a kid. No spray back then, so all the guys who worked in the field wore khaki pants with cuffs they dusted their boots and sprinkled their cuffs with a good shot of sulphur powder each morning, as well as their waist-band, collar and cuffs. They smelled funny, but had no problems with chiggers or ticks.
 
mikea said:
Why isn't there a human version of K9 Advantix? It kills and repels ticks and mosquitos for a month with one treatment. http://k9advantix.petparents.com/howItWorks.cfm Only one dog didn't like it for a few minutes after it was applied.
Click to expand...

Probably because the stuff is really toxic on your liver. Our vet said it'll take a couple of years off your dogs life.
 
wabower said:
Dad was a USDA guy who oversaw dam-building projects in western OK when I was a kid. No spray back then, so all the guys who worked in the field wore khaki pants with cuffs they dusted their boots and sprinkled their cuffs with a good shot of sulphur powder each morning, as well as their waist-band, collar and cuffs. They smelled funny, but had no problems with chiggers or ticks.
Click to expand...


When I had the ranch in TX, I used to dust the yard with sulfur and the ticks would leave.
 
I hope everyone here who is mentioning first hand experience with tick bites is going to get checked for Lyme/Babesia etc, STAT! Don't mess with it.

The %^&* thing hadn't attached yet, and there are no red marks, so I think I'm good... I hope. Naturally when you google this you get ominous warnings about the ticks you DIDN'T see... gah.
 
mikea said:
<SNIP>
Why isn't there a human version of K9 Advantix? It kills and repels ticks and mosquitos for a month with one treatment. http://k9advantix.petparents.com/howItWorks.cfm Only one dog didn't like it for a few minutes after it was applied.
Click to expand...

Henning said:
Probably because the stuff is really toxic on your liver. Our vet said it'll take a couple of years off your dogs life.
Click to expand...
More likely they don't want to go through the FDA trials for human use. Both compounds are pesticides. They probably don't want the liability either. Imidacloprid contains part of the structure of nicotine- activists would be all over that as soon as it hit the market. Permethrin is non-toxic to most mammals, but cats are an exception- the web site cited by MikeA indicates not to use K9advantix on cats. One can imagine the lawsuits after someone applies a permethrin compound to themselves, then kills fluffy by playing with him.

No reason to go through all that when DEET works well enough.
 
My German Shepherd nearly died from Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever. One day he fell over and was paralyzed, and long story short, a vet neurologist finally diagnosed him with RMSF. He was on doxycycline for three months, it took him a month before he could walk again, and six months before he was almost normal. He died a year later from hemangiosarcoma, a blood-borne cancer, that they attribute to the RMSF.

So ticks can cause all sorts of nasty diseases.

Oh, Frontline caused burn marks on his skin. He had chemical burns from Frontline where hair never grew back, a string of bare circles down his spine. Amitraz (Preventic) works well at killing ticks, but it's highly toxic if accidentally ingested.
 
wsuffa said:
Only time I needed to use 100% DEET was when I went to Egypt. Wanted to be extra sure to ward off the skeeters there. Had malaria pills along, too, just in case.
Click to expand...

Bought 4 1 fl oz bottles of Repel 100 (100% DEET) in preparation for a safari in Kruger National Park in South Africa in 2005. Malaria is endemic there. Anti malaria pills for the duration and a week afterwards as well. Only used part of the 1st bottle between the two of us in the 4 days we were there. Didn't have any mosquito bites, either. :D
 
Last edited:
I think you mean DEET? It may be DDT if you got something locally...
 
Our vet said it'll take a couple of years off your dogs life.
Click to expand...

Sniff. Sniff. What is that smell?!


11bpyet.gif




.
.
 
woodstock said:
I hope everyone here who is mentioning first hand experience with tick bites is going to get checked for Lyme/Babesia etc, STAT! Don't mess with it.

The %^&* thing hadn't attached yet, and there are no red marks, so I think I'm good... I hope. Naturally when you google this you get ominous warnings about the ticks you DIDN'T see... gah.
Click to expand...
Yes, it's the ones you didn't see that stay on long enough to cause trouble...
 
I've been reading his columns about whether to sell or keep, just didn't know he had made a decision. There's only one paint job in the world like that, so when I saw your avatar . . .

azure said:
Yes, why?
Click to expand...
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top