TICKS: a removal method that works

[Challenger]

Ticks, don't you just love to see one buried deep into your skin or your pet?

Nah, me neither. There are a score of wrong ways to try to remove them. But I found a sure fire way to remove them fully intact & alive.

And here's a 57 second video to prove seeing is believing. This little tool sells for about $5.00 & probably can be found at most pet stores or on the net.

TICK TWISTER

[hookset6969]

That thing is pretty slick, My mom puts vasaline on them and she said that it stop's the tick from being able to get air and they would die and come right off in a very short amount of time, I don't know how true this is but it must work because she does it on her dogs. She will also use baby oil.

[shaman]

You have to understand that we pick hundreds of ticks off ourselves and our dogs each year.  In fact, I generally keep soda can with a swallow or two of liquid in the bottom by the bed during the summer as a tick receptacle.

Generally speaking, whenever you try to get fancy with the ticks, that's when you get into trouble. If I go in and pick them off with my finger nails-- no problem. Fingernails are nature's tick groomers.  That's why man, apes and monkeys have nails.  When I get fancy and try forceps, tweezers, chemicals, etc. I have all kinds of problems.

The last thing you want to do is kill the tick when it's attached to the skin.  If they die when they're attached to you, they up-chuck the contents of their stomach into you.  At minimum you get a hearty little staph infection that needs to be treated with triple antibiotic.  At worst you get one of those nasty tick-borne infections that can kill you in as little as 24 hours.  Light pressure will usually work. Don't crush it. 

I've had to go to the doctor twice over tick bites.  One was from trying to get a deer tick off using alcohol and a swab to poison it.    The other was from trying to use tweezers.   In both cases I got a nasty ring rash developing within 24 hours.  They gave me anti-biotics and sent off a sample for testing-- both times it came back negative for Lyme Disease, and I breathed a sigh of relief.

However, this is nothing to fool with.  My wife nearly died from Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever when she was young, and the doctor has told me that Lyme Disease is just one of several nasty tick-borne diseases you'll get if you horse around with ticks.  Luckily we're not living in an area that has Lyme, but we can't go to Deer Camp in the summertime without having a dozen deer ticks on us within the first hour we're there. As long as they're crawling, no problem.s

I had a dog that suddenly had his back legs go out from underneath him.  We rushed him to the vet with him unable to stand up straight. It was tick paralysis-- sometimes dogs are just sensitive to ticks and get a general paralysis when they get too many ticks on him.  He already was being treated for ticks-- a collar and such, but there were just too many latching on over too short of a time.  He got a bath and a treatment at the doctors and it all went away in under 8 hours.

Things I've learned about living with ticks:

1)  I wear shorts in the summer.  90% of the ticks you get jump onto your legs. You can just keep an eye on your legs and be fairly assured you'll get them while they're still crawling.
2)  Of the 10% that make it past your shorts, 90% don't stop crawling until they get to your hairline at your neck.  If I feel something on my neck, I go for it.
3)  I keep my beard trimmed way back in the summer.  The worst spot to get a tick out is usually when it gets in your beard-- that and your crotch.
4)  Tick will keep crawling on me for the better part of a day.  If you buddy up with a partner and do a serious tick patrol once a day you're probably not going to have trouble.  KYHillChick and I do each other.

What you really should do, and we often times don't,  is save every attached tick on a piece of cellophane tape.  Tick goes on tape. Tape goes on 3X5 card. Date goes on 3X5 card.  If you get flu-like symptoms afterwards, and they're looking for what caused it, give the card to the doc.  Flu symptoms in summer can be all sorts of nasty stuff.  If you miss Lyme Disease at this point, your goose is cooked.  If they miss Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever the next step is coma, after the coma, treatment may mean digging a hole.

[hookset6969]

What's the best way to remove them once they have started sucking blood? And is this when you need to get worried about disease?

[shaman]

Until the tick attaches, there really is no danger whatsoever.  After they attach you have to be careful. If you can get a fingernail under them and pry up that usually gets them scrambling to reattach.   After that, it's a matter of just pulling them off.  It's just important that a) you don't crush them and b) you don't rip their head off.    Be gentle but persuasive. 

There may be a reason for all the technology.  I don't know.  All I know is that for the dozens I pick off my body every year, there never seems to be much of a problem.  The crawlers outnumber the diggers about 10 to 1.  90% of the ones that attach do so on the back of my skull, just inside the hairline on the back of my neck.  However, I've had them attach just about everywhere over the years. They like having hair to grab to help attach. I've had them in my armpit, my chest, the back of my knee, the back of my arm, my crotch and my ear lobe. The majority of these came from backwoods camping and backpacking, where I was too busy paying attention to other things.

They're actually fairly resilient creatures, and frightfully hard to kill unless you really mean to.   When I was a kid my grandfather got me a gag Christmas present:  a 100% guaranteed bug killer.  It was two blocks of wood. One was painted red, the other white. The red one had a target that said: "Put  bug here.  Place White block on top.  Apply pressure."    That's about my favorite method.  Instead of the two blocks, I'll use the handle of my Swiss Army Knife-- see, there's yet another use for a Swiss Army Knife!!!   I pick a deer tick off, place it on the table and put the side of the knife handle down on it until I get a pleasant "POP!" 

Dropping them in the toilet is a good way to do it back home in the city.   They can't crawl out, and I think they drown.  They at least stop moving. However, down at the farm, it is not such a good idea.  Our sewage pipe runs about 150 out the back and ends  out in a pasture.    It used to run only 50 feet, but I added 100 feet of corrugated plastic pipe to the end an ran it out into the field.  I move the end of the pipe every couple of months.  If we were to flush the ticks, I have visions of an army of soiled ticks laying in wait for us, crazed with revenge and biding their time for a march on the house.  It gives me the shivers.

If there is any redness around the attachment point, it probably would be a good idea to save the tick with the scotch tape method I described.  Normally the bite, given a little triple anti-biotic goes away fairly quickly.  If it gets big(I've had one go to pie-plate size) or it gets a ring (spreading infection-- think Lyme) consult a physician immediately. The stuff you can get off a tick is truly horrendous. Lyme and RMSF are the most popular scare stories, but my doctor assures me that there are much worse out there  if you want to dig for it-- pardon the pun.

I'm sure we have friends in the city who won't come see us anymore, but if you have deer you have ticks.  I used to think it took turkeys to cause turkey mites, but I have since found out chiggers and turkey mites are both larval forms of ticks. When we camp anywhere in Kentucky, I spray the ground outside the tent with Raid House and Garden.  I got an infestation of turkey mites one night down in the Big South Fork.  They attacked my crotch and armpits-- maybe a hundred bites all told. Each one was a painful raised welt like a flea bite from a saber-toothed crotch cricket.  Yikes!

[hookset6969]

Thank's for the info [:)]