Posted: 6/1/2009 6:51:07 AM EDT
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So my dad and I had a not so smart moment on my trip to the south part of Nashville and went tracking some turkeys into the brush. My dad said there were some roads back in there and we could walk up those he was wrong... we only made it in about 80 feet and noticed a tick crawling on my arm. I stated Tick to him and then I found another and then another all crawling on my arms and looking for a place to grab on. we headed out of the brush pretty quick and started picking them off. I picked off about 9 or so and he about 12 none of them had attached. They were Lone Star Ticks for those who care.
My wife freaked out when I asked her to check me for ticks as it was her first experience. That I have to say was comical. How do the guys that do the road side maintenance or the farmers who do the brush hogging deal with them? I would assume copious amounts of DEET or perhaps it just gets so common that its just a way of life. |
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If they attach, you can either paint them with clear nail polish or put a dab of dish detergetn on a cotton ball. Place the wet cotton on the tick for 10-20 seconds and off it will come This is poor advice. The CDC has quite a bit written about removal of ticks and I strongly suggest reading it. If you dab them with nail polish, dish detergent, or any other kind of witch's brew, they will probably regurgitate blood and that increases the likelihood of you getting a disease from it. The best way to remove a tick is with a tick remover - simply pull the thing off using no squeezing pressure, and slow, steady force. There are a lot of old wive's tales about ticks and chiggers that persist to the modern day. While I realize that people are trying to be helpful, it irritates me to no end to see ignorant and potentially harmful information repeated over and over... |
| Be careful with the smoldering match or putting any chemicals on them to make them release, this will make the tick regurgitate (puke) as part of releasing the mouth. Also don't sqeeze the body when you go to extract them. If it's been sucking on you and is infected with Lyme disease or rocky mountain spotted fever or some other tick-borne pathogen, you don't want to make him puke it back into you before he lets go. Get some good sharp tweezers or a hemostat and grip their head then pull them out. 100% DEET FTW |
| This device is the greatest tick removal tool I have ever used. 4-5 seconds total time and the tick is out, no fuss no muss. FYI the ticks in TN are very heavy in numbers this year. A coworker went hunting 3 weeks ago and had deet on, but wound up with 39 ticks on himself. He wound up going to the doctor and getting meds from the ill effects from them. Also my pastors son got one and has lyme disease. Both cases are from the Nashville area. |
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If they attach, you can either paint them with clear nail polish or put a dab of dish detergetn on a cotton ball. Place the wet cotton on the tick for 10-20 seconds and off it will come This is poor advice. The CDC has quite a bit written about removal of ticks and I strongly suggest reading it. If you dab them with nail polish, dish detergent, or any other kind of witch's brew, they will probably regurgitate blood and that increases the likelihood of you getting a disease from it. The best way to remove a tick is with a tick remover - simply pull the thing off using no squeezing pressure, and slow, steady force. There are a lot of old wive's tales about ticks and chiggers that persist to the modern day. While I realize that people are trying to be helpful, it irritates me to no end to see ignorant and potentially harmful information repeated over and over... +1 Either pull them out slowly by hand, or with tweezers. Don't yank them off, because part of them may stay. 
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I load up with DEET type repellant. Tick prefer grassy and brushy areas. Do your best not to rub up against grass and brush when you are in the woods.
I always carry tweezers and a small bottle of iodine when I am in the woods. After removing it with tweezers, pour iodine on the bite area. This will help kill many of the pathogens carried by these disgusting creatures. |
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This device is the greatest tick removal tool I have ever used. 4-5 seconds total time and the tick is out, no fuss no muss. FYI the ticks in TN are very heavy in numbers this year. A coworker went hunting 3 weeks ago and had deet on, but wound up with 39 ticks on himself. He wound up going to the doctor and getting meds from the ill effects from them. Also my pastors son got one and has lyme disease. Both cases are from the Nashville area. Is there ever a safe time of year to head into the woods without the fear of ticks? |
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This device is the greatest tick removal tool I have ever used. 4-5 seconds total time and the tick is out, no fuss no muss. FYI the ticks in TN are very heavy in numbers this year. A coworker went hunting 3 weeks ago and had deet on, but wound up with 39 ticks on himself. He wound up going to the doctor and getting meds from the ill effects from them. Also my pastors son got one and has lyme disease. Both cases are from the Nashville area. Is there ever a safe time of year to head into the woods without the fear of ticks? Winter? |
| Permethrin. Treat your clothes (NOT your skin) with it, and it lasts months, even through washings. It's a plant based insecticide. Strong stuff... i've had ticks crawling up my pants legs that literally slowed down, stopped, and DIED before making it more than six inches. |
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Chiggers are worse in my opinion. You are dead wrong. Ticks carry Lyme. Chiggers just make you itch like crazy. I'd rather have a million chigger bites than the one, single, magical Tick bite that gives me a disease for which there is no cure. Oh, wait, you're probably thinking that the chigger burrows its way under your skin and stays there until you cover the spot with some kind of ointment that makes it die and then rot under your skin? Please read up on what a Chigger actually does. They do not burrow under your skin, you don't have to suffocate them with nail polish. Again, the CDC has great information on this. Or heck, just read the Wiki. |
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Permethrin. Treat your clothes (NOT your skin) with it, and it lasts months, even through washings. It's a plant based insecticide. Strong stuff... i've had ticks crawling up my pants legs that literally slowed down, stopped, and DIED before making it more than six inches. Where would you acquire such a substance? Is it something sold over the counter? |
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Permathrin. +10,000 This is the best stuff their is. ( Can buy at Walmart) This past spring turkey hunting, I used the stuff along with camera guy. Partner doing the calling did not. The camera guy and I had none, Partner had 26 on him. He was sitting 3 -4 feet away from us all the time. Made everyone a believer. I have also been told by the "Old Timers" that eating a lot of garlic for couple weeks prior works also. Makes the ticks not want to latch on to you. |
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Permethrin. Treat your clothes (NOT your skin) with it, and it lasts months, even through washings. It's a plant based insecticide. Strong stuff... i've had ticks crawling up my pants legs that literally slowed down, stopped, and DIED before making it more than six inches. Where would you acquire such a substance? Is it something sold over the counter? Sure, you can get the stuff at Wal-mart, REI, your favourite army navy surplus store... it's fairly ubiquitous. |
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Permethrin. Treat your clothes (NOT your skin) with it, and it lasts months, even through washings. It's a plant based insecticide. Strong stuff... i've had ticks crawling up my pants legs that literally slowed down, stopped, and DIED before making it more than six inches. Where would you acquire such a substance? Is it something sold over the counter? Yeah. You can get it at most places that sell sporting goods. Walmart sells a brand of it that you apply via spray can.. I bought a pump bottle from Bass Pro that had enough to do about 5 full outfits. You do it in advance.. spray it on your clothes, let them dry, and they're treated. You don't want it on your skin when wet..but once dry, it forms a molecular bond to the clothing. It won't wash off, just wears off over time (months) and gradually loses effectiveness. I can vouch that it works.. I hike in Arkansas yearly during the summer and have yet to get a tick. |
| I went to a PME school near Neosho, MO one year. During the course, we had a couple of days of land navigation out in the woods. Tics galore. I used flea collars around my ankles, believe it or not, and had just one tic after two days-even though I found quite a few crawling on me. I heard some talk about wearing womens nylons being effective, but I didn't see anybody actually try it. |
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I sware by this device.
http://www.tickedoff.com/ 
I own six of them.. stored with fishing, camping, hunting, autos emergency kits . |
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Mucho DEET helps, but is not impenetrable. Instead of getting 6-8, you might just get 1-2. Routine full body checks become SOP. Seems like we are set for a really bad year here in Missouri. They were a bad as I ever remember them this past turkey season in NE MO. In the first weekend alone, I got prolly 15 or 20 before they dug in. Unfortunately, I missed about 5 that did dig in. |
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I once did tick born disease research here in Oklahoma. When we went to the woods we wore light colored clothing, tucked in our shirts (no button ups) and tucked our pants into our boots. As we walked through the woods we would just flick the ticks off of us as we saw them. We carried duck tape with us and used the sticky side to get the "seed" ticks off.
Just for info sake ticks have 3 life stages: larva, nymphs, and adults. Larva are what people refer to as seed ticks and they are usually in big numbers because they have just hatched from an egg mass. Ticks usually have to feed on an infected host before they can transfer disease so we didn't worry so much about catching anything from seed ticks but I wouldn't take any chances. Also, all the experts I've talked to say ticks have to have been attached for 24 to 48 hours before disease is transmitted. If you do remove a tick and start to show flu like symptoms have a doctor put you on Docicycline emediately. It gets most of the really bad diseases like Rocky Mt. Spotted Fever and Eurlikiosis (forgive my spelling), and I think even Lyme Disease. I don't think it gets Tularemia but I'm not sure. Anyway, hope this is helpful- |
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Chiggers are worse in my opinion. You are dead wrong. Ticks carry Lyme. Chiggers just make you itch like crazy. I'd rather have a million chigger bites than the one, single, magical Tick bite that gives me a disease for which there is no cure. Oh, wait, you're probably thinking that the chigger burrows its way under your skin and stays there until you cover the spot with some kind of ointment that makes it die and then rot under your skin? Please read up on what a Chigger actually does. They do not burrow under your skin, you don't have to suffocate them with nail polish. Again, the CDC has great information on this. Or heck, just read the Wiki. I hope you're not suggesting that lyme disease is not curable because you would be dead wrong. I just carry tweezers with me while I'm in the woods now to pick the little fuckers off. |
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Chiggers are worse in my opinion. You are dead wrong. Ticks carry Lyme. Chiggers just make you itch like crazy. I'd rather have a million chigger bites than the one, single, magical Tick bite that gives me a disease for which there is no cure. Oh, wait, you're probably thinking that the chigger burrows its way under your skin and stays there until you cover the spot with some kind of ointment that makes it die and then rot under your skin? Please read up on what a Chigger actually does. They do not burrow under your skin, you don't have to suffocate them with nail polish. Again, the CDC has great information on this. Or heck, just read the Wiki. I hope you're not suggesting that lyme disease is not curable because you would be dead wrong. I just carry tweezers with me while I'm in the woods now to pick the little fuckers off. As far as I know, Lyme can be prevented - but once you have a case of Lyme, it cannot be fully cured. Beat into remission, yes (If it's caught in time) - but not eradicated from the body. |
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Chiggers are worse in my opinion. You are dead wrong. Ticks carry Lyme. Chiggers just make you itch like crazy. I'd rather have a million chigger bites than the one, single, magical Tick bite that gives me a disease for which there is no cure. Oh, wait, you're probably thinking that the chigger burrows its way under your skin and stays there until you cover the spot with some kind of ointment that makes it die and then rot under your skin? Please read up on what a Chigger actually does. They do not burrow under your skin, you don't have to suffocate them with nail polish. Again, the CDC has great information on this. Or heck, just read the Wiki. I hope you're not suggesting that lyme disease is not curable because you would be dead wrong. I just carry tweezers with me while I'm in the woods now to pick the little fuckers off. As far as I know, Lyme can be prevented - but once you have a case of Lyme, it cannot be fully cured. Beat into remission, yes (If it's caught in time) - but not eradicated from the body. From Web MD: "How is it treated? The main treatment for Lyme disease is antibiotics. These medicines usually cure Lyme disease within 3 weeks of starting treatment. It’s important to get treatment for Lyme disease as soon as you can. Talk to your doctor if you have had a tick attached to your skin, especially if you live in an area where Lyme disease has been reported. Look for early signs of the disease, such as a round, red rash that gets bigger or symptoms like those you'd get with the flu." |
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Chiggers are worse in my opinion. You are dead wrong. Ticks carry Lyme. Chiggers just make you itch like crazy. I'd rather have a million chigger bites than the one, single, magical Tick bite that gives me a disease for which there is no cure. Oh, wait, you're probably thinking that the chigger burrows its way under your skin and stays there until you cover the spot with some kind of ointment that makes it die and then rot under your skin? Please read up on what a Chigger actually does. They do not burrow under your skin, you don't have to suffocate them with nail polish. Again, the CDC has great information on this. Or heck, just read the Wiki. I hope you're not suggesting that lyme disease is not curable because you would be dead wrong. I just carry tweezers with me while I'm in the woods now to pick the little fuckers off. As far as I know, Lyme can be prevented - but once you have a case of Lyme, it cannot be fully cured. Beat into remission, yes (If it's caught in time) - but not eradicated from the body. I had Lyme disease for 3 1/2 years, it got bad enough to where it caused encephalopathy with me and heart problems, all it took was 9 months of all different kinds of antibiotics to destroy it. The problem with Lyme is the different things it does, sometimes it crosses the blood-brain barrier, which in that case there's only 2 antibiotics that are effective against Lyme that can cross that barrier, in some cases the bacteria takes on a cystic form in which case a different antibiotic is needed to treat it, also it can deform the cell wall (Pretty sure it's called an L-form wall if I remember correctly) and in that case you need a combination of 3 different antibiotics to eradicate it. It's pretty complicated and difficult to treat since most of the antibiotics are intravenous and are hard on your liver and such, but it is curable if you have a competent Lyme-literate specialist on your side. 
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| Man up city boys. Out here in the country we just avoid going into tall weeds and brush during tick and chigger season. If we do, we spray down with a good deet repellent around ankles and waist then a general spray over our pants and shirt. If you find a tick dug in later, just pull it off with your finger tips making sure the head comes out. Watch the area for signs of infection and Lyme disease. I pulled three seed ticks off yesterday and am still among the living! |