# Today my wife woke me in a panic



## TorontoBuilder (Oct 18, 2022)

Today my wife woke me in a panic.

She needed me to look at a spot on her skin. 

Next there commenced 5 to 10 minutes of shrieking, wailing and general hysterics as I noted that it was a tick embedded in her skin. 

I promise to do better the next time this happens. 



Seriously though, she did have a tick, which was as the saying goes dug in like a tick. but it had yet to feed on her and I was able to grab a pair of tweezers and expertly extract the tick without leaving any body parts remaining embedded in the skin. For a suburban area we have an inordinate number of ticks. He are ravine adjacent and have deer, coyotes, rabbits and ticks galore. I'm surprised this was her first actually. 

Just a reminder, tick season in Ontario lasts until well past the first snows.


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## 7milesup (Oct 18, 2022)

Well, wouldn't that tick ya off.
Your wife was certainly not tickled about having a tick and appeared to be ticked off.


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## TorontoBuilder (Oct 18, 2022)

7milesup said:


> Well, wouldn't that tick ya off.


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## RJSakowski (Oct 18, 2022)

I haven't seen a deer tick in several months.  I know they're out there and will be active until the ground freezes.

We have a wooded area, including several grass meadows, that we walk out dog through several times a day.  I keep the grass mowed short which seems to keep the incidence of ticks down.  The dog has medication to repel/kill ticks.  The result is they will sometimes latch on to him and, not liking the taste, drop off onto my wife or me.  Although he runs through the tall grass and underbrush, the number of incidents is less than ten a year.  In contrast, all of our neighbors who don't maintain trails and/or tick repellent for their dogs have tons of ticks.  

It is a bit of a pain mowing for several hours every two weeks but it seems to work.  Anyhow, that's my story and I'm sticking to it.  On the plus side, having a set of groomed trails makes it a pleasure walking the dog.


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## wachuko (Oct 18, 2022)

No side effects from it!?  A friend got pretty sick from one…


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## RJSakowski (Oct 18, 2022)

I've had about one bad bite per year.  So far, no Lyme disease.  Knock wood and all that.


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## TorontoBuilder (Oct 18, 2022)

wachuko said:


> No side effects from it!?  A friend got pretty sick from one…



The key is to detect the tick quickly and remove it without squeezing and having it expel fluids into the wound. It's why tick treatments like Nexgard Spectra work, they cause ticks to drop off before they have a meal drastically lessening the chance of infecting with lyme disease. 

What really sucks is that there used to be a Lyme disease vaccine for humans 20 years ago but the company that made it dropped it's manufacture due to lower than desired profitability. They should have waited for climate change to really kick in and cause Lyme to spread and explode.


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## markba633csi (Oct 18, 2022)

I've heard the best thing to do is to put some olive or vegetable oil on the tick and he will pull out to get air- then you grab him
Apparently they breathe through their butts
-M


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## 7milesup (Oct 18, 2022)

markba633csi said:


> Apparently they breathe through their butts
> -M


Of course, they would.  Instead of being a mouth breather, they are an ass breather.  I would expect no less of those miserable creatures.


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## Janderso (Oct 18, 2022)

Back in the 80's, my wife and I went to Oklahoma to visit her relatives in Pickins and Idabell.
We took a walk into this beautiful meadow/pasture. Being a California boy, I was unaware of the dangers that lurked within.
Have you ever heard of chiggers? ticks too.
I had to check all the dark moist places on her body 
She did the same to me.
"Miserable creatures" I believe my 7milesup friend said. Yes I agree.

Tick removal ----https://www.cdc.gov/ticks/removing_a_tick.html

Chigger >>>>


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## markba633csi (Oct 18, 2022)

The question being, since they are ass breathers, what happens when they fart?
BTW nice color on that chigger- is that Krylon or Rustoleum?


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## wachuko (Oct 18, 2022)

Janderso said:


> Back in the 80's, my wife and I went to Oklahoma to visit her relatives in Pickins and Idabell.
> We took a walk into this beautiful meadow/pasture. Being a California boy, I was unaware of the dangers that lurked within.
> Have you ever heard of chiggers? ticks too.
> I had to check all the dark moist places on her body
> ...


We have those in Florida too... SOAB... nail polish on top of the area to get rid of them...  learned the hard way... from that point on I used repellent every time I went to the property.... hated those...


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## savarin (Oct 18, 2022)

Never had a tick on me but have had plenty of leeches, I hated those.


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## pdentrem (Oct 18, 2022)

One of my cousins reported that his wife had removed over 137 and stopped counting this was after a couple weeks in heavy bush a few years back! My grandfather would pluck them off all the time when working the top field.
Pierre


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## TorontoBuilder (Oct 18, 2022)

pdentrem said:


> One of my cousins reported that his wife had removed over 137 and stopped counting this was after a couple weeks in heavy bush a few years back! My grandfather would pluck them off all the time when working the top field.
> Pierre


I used to be serious outdoor enthusiast, and had plenty of ticks in the past, but before Lyme disease became ubiquitous in south eastern Ontario.  I'd not to have a tick bite me now... because I'd likely not notice it and get infected


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## Janderso (Oct 18, 2022)

savarin said:


> Never had a tick on me but have had plenty of leeches, I hated those.


When I saw Humphry Bogart pull those leaches off, it gave me the heebie geebies.


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## Dabbler (Oct 18, 2022)

I went to a series of mock rescue exercises in Colorado about a decade ago.  One of the locations had us bushwacking through scrub evergreens.  That night we got a knock on our motel doors to check for ticks.  The worst guy had 17.  I had 5.  Hate them to this day.....


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## Ken from ontario (Oct 18, 2022)

Have you guys ever used a tick key to remove ticks? does it even work? $14 for a key


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## graham-xrf (Oct 19, 2022)

WD-40 works. So does Acetone. Also, gasoline, paint stripper, brake cleaner, freezer spray.
The anti-tick fluid that one drips a line of down a dog's back smells as yuk for the dog as does for humans - so absolutely not!

I get it that all these have their downsides. When I (long ago) lived in Africa, "grey tick fever" was rife, and being afflicted was very serious!

Maybe there can be had one of those cosmetic body moisturizing creams that can be used instead of soap in the shower, that might leave a bad taste for the tick?


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## C-Bag (Oct 19, 2022)

Ken from ontario said:


> Have you guys ever used a tick key to remove ticks? does it even work? $14 for a key


Works like a champ! Been using it for over 10yrs. Noticed it in REI one day and tried it as we had ticks everywhere. So impressed we bought one for each of our friends and family with dogs.


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## RJSakowski (Oct 19, 2022)

I have had three ticks embedded over the past year.  After the last one, I got the tick removal tool.  Once the tick is removed, I coat the wound site with tincture of iodine and follow up for next few days with a topical antibiotic ointment.  I also contact my GP and request a prescription of doxycyline.  tick bite take up to three months to heal for me.  All my neighbors and several friends have had Lyme disease but so far I have managed to avoid it.  The quarterly dose of Brevecta the dog gets seems to keep him tick free.


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## vtcnc (Oct 19, 2022)

markba633csi said:


> The question being, since they are ass breathers, what happens when they fart?


they eat Little Tiny Mentos


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## vtcnc (Oct 19, 2022)

graham-xrf said:


> WD-40 works. So does Acetone. Also, gasoline, paint stripper, brake cleaner, freezer spray.
> 
> Maybe there can be had one of those cosmetic body moisturizing creams that can be used instead of soap in the shower, that might leave a bad taste for the tick?


I wonder what my wife would say if I started spraying the kids down with brake cleaner on our next camping trip?


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## lordbeezer (Oct 19, 2022)

I hate ticks. Has Rocky Mountain spotted fever 3 times. Hard to get over if you ever do. Bug juice will melt leeches into a gooey mess


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## graham-xrf (Oct 19, 2022)

@vtcnc 
I have a long history of fairly extreme chemical warfare on insects, particularly blood-sucking kinds that want to leave a person with malaria, and much else.

In Botswana, I had this nightly ritual to clear the _rondawel_ of mosquitos. I would ensure all the mosquito screens were closed. Sleep under a net, etc. I hated the green slow-burn pyrethrum incense spirals. The mozzies seemed to fly on unharmed, regardless I hit them with direct blast from the spray can.  Then one day I grabbed a can, blasted it, and the insect started to lose altitude immediately, crashing to a stop. I looked at the can, and it was collar spray starch! About 10,000x as effective as anything else one could buy! From that point on, I got way more aggressive with what I would take on insects with.

You can't go anywhere in that bush without collecting ticks, though I managed not to let any get to my skin. Getting them out of the clothes was easiest done with a drop of 105 Octane Aviation AVGas.

Tsetse flies were harder to lose.  Painful, and they cause trypanosomiasis (sleeping sickness). The list goes on. My ultimate deterrents were extreme solvent hydrocarbons, poisoned vaseline, boiling water (on larvae), and fire!

[Edit: I forgot Bayer 70 to take out the little snails on water hyacinth near the shores of dams I would sail on. These would propagate bilharzia. Bloody fluke worms that get in your blood! ]


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## TorontoBuilder (Oct 19, 2022)

Ken from ontario said:


> Have you guys ever used a tick key to remove ticks? does it even work? $14 for a key



They work, sometimes. So do a few credit card like cards with slots, sometimes. Mountain Equipment coop sells them for under 10 bucks IIRC.

But I still use $3 tweezers because they work for every size of tick. The slot of the tick key is too wide to properly pinch small ticks to grab them and flip them out.

DO NOT use anything on ticks like acetone, oils, of other nonsense. Dont use your nails to pull out ticks you filthy animals... you're full of germs.

Once the tick is out immediately soak the wound in alcohol, use a cotton swab and scrub the wound clean. That will kill any lyme disease causing bacteria. Then dress the wound with anti-bacterial ointment and pray. 

Lone star ticks are now in Ontario, and frankly if one ever bit me I'd have to consider medically assisted dying, living without red meat is torture. I can't live without red meat. I have an auto-immune disorder that makes it a virtual certainty that I'd develop an allegic reaction from exposure to alpha-gal molecule in the lone star tick. I already live on antihistamines because I have overactive mast cells


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## TorontoBuilder (Oct 19, 2022)

It's still alive and kicking... t

How much oxygen does a tick need? I had it in sealed mason jar. Time for an alcohol bath?


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## RJSakowski (Oct 20, 2022)

When I remove a tick, I place it on a piece of scotch tape and then fold the tape over it.  None has escaped that entombment.


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## mmcmdl (Oct 20, 2022)

vtcnc said:


> I wonder what my wife would say if I started spraying the kids down with brake cleaner on our next camping trip?


I had to take WD-40 showers down at the Sunpapers plant to remove the ink off of my body and hair . You talk about a mess !


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## graham-xrf (Oct 20, 2022)

TorontoBuilder said:


> It's still alive and kicking... t
> 
> How much oxygen does a tick need? I had it in sealed mason jar. Time for an alcohol bath?


21% of the gas in the jar is oxygen. The size of a tick metabolism is tiny.
I don't know how ticks and suchlike do their energy exchange, but I think it may not be like humans do with lungs and expelling CO2.
It might be OK for weeks, who knows. They can't survive without moisture.

Cockroaches survive airline flights in the unpressurized undercarriage cavities, and it does not seem to bother them.
At 40,000 ft the pressure is only about 2.7psi and temperature -56°C  (-70F)
Solvents, on the other hand, will cut through the oily film on their body casing.  Acetone?


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## TorontoBuilder (Oct 20, 2022)

hammer time..






Ball peen of course. Not even cockroaches survive that. 

When I was 18 my apartment building had cockroaches. I'd squirt them with lemon pledge to slow them down, and them hammer em dead. At least my apartment always smelled fresh and had shiny floors.


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## 7milesup (Oct 20, 2022)

TorontoBuilder said:


> It's still alive and kicking... t
> 
> How much oxygen does a tick need? I had it in sealed mason jar. Time for an alcohol bath?
> 
> View attachment 423999


I flush them down the toilet.  Maybe I am developing a new gigantic species of tick in our sewer systems that will eventually burst its way of a man-hole cover to crawl through the city streets.  But then again, one exposure to one of my dumps and I am confident it will die a horrible death.


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## TorontoBuilder (Oct 20, 2022)

7milesup said:


> I flush them down the toilet.  Maybe I am developing a new gigantic species of tick in our sewer systems that will eventually burst its way of a man-hole cover to crawl through the city streets.  But then again, one exposure to one of my dumps and I am confident it will die a horrible death.


Our sewers are a terrible chemical stew of excreted drug residues and viral loads. 

I hate to think of the potential mutated ticks that could emerge from such environs


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## vtcnc (Oct 20, 2022)

graham-xrf said:


> Acetone?


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## vtcnc (Oct 20, 2022)

graham-xrf said:


> @vtcnc
> I have a long history of fairly extreme chemical warfare on insects, particularly blood-sucking kinds that want to leave a person with malaria, and much else.
> 
> In Botswana, I had this nightly ritual to clear the _rondawel_ of mosquitos. I would ensure all the mosquito screens were closed. Sleep under a net, etc. I hated the green slow-burn pyrethrum incense spirals. The mozzies seemed to fly on unharmed, regardless I hit them with direct blast from the spray can.  Then one day I grabbed a can, blasted it, and the insect started to lose altitude immediately, crashing to a stop. I looked at the can, and it was collar spray starch! About 10,000x as effective as anything else one could buy! From that point on, I got way more aggressive with what I would take on insects with.
> ...


Sometimes I think the winters in Vermont are too much to bear. Then I hear stories like this and go inside.


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## Dabbler (Oct 20, 2022)

vtcnc said:


> Sometimes I think the winters in Vermont are too much to bear.


You have an open invitation to visit Calgary any January.  You may get +20C or you may get -35C.  Either way, you only have to wait a day or 2....


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## FOMOGO (Oct 20, 2022)

Ya never know, we might get lucky and get this guy. One of my favorite hero's, The Tick. Mike


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## TorontoBuilder (Oct 20, 2022)

Dabbler said:


> You have an open invitation to visit Calgary any January.  You may get +20C or you may get -35C.  Either way, you only have to wait a day or 2....


when I lived in moose jaw we only seemed to get -40, the only variable was whether it was blizzardy -40 or crystal clear and still -40

I still remember in mid 1980s it was so cold the pipes burst INSIDE the regina airport when I was piping up brother for his one and only visit to the province.


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## vtcnc (Oct 20, 2022)

FOMOGO said:


> Ya never know, we might get lucky and get this guy. One of my favorite hero's. Mike
> 
> View attachment 424078


OK, I loved that comic book. But now the test for 90s indie comic fans. Any Badger readers out there?


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## 7milesup (Oct 20, 2022)

vtcnc said:


> OK, I loved that comic book. But now the test for 90s indie comic fans. Any Badger readers out there?


No, but I have listened to Badger.


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## vtcnc (Oct 20, 2022)

7milesup said:


> No, but I have listened to Badger.



What the…?!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## RrhatBruce (Oct 20, 2022)

This year's personal best.  All because I foolishly let the dog talk me into a trail I knew would have tall grass, and therefore loads of freshly hatched seed ticks. But it was late summer and we were both bored with staying on the safe trails. At this point the best solution is wrapping a very tacky tape around and pulling them off.


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## RJSakowski (Oct 20, 2022)

RrhatBruce said:


> This year's personal best.  All because I foolishly let the dog talk me into a trail I knew would have tall grass, and therefore loads of freshly hatched seed ticks. But it was late summer and we were both bored with staying on the safe trails. At this point the best solution is wrapping a very tacky tape around and pulling them off.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Love the two adult ticks for size comparison!


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## savarin (Oct 20, 2022)

Holy cow I would freak out at that load.


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## TorontoBuilder (Oct 20, 2022)

RrhatBruce said:


> This year's personal best.  All because I foolishly let the dog talk me into a trail I knew would have tall grass, and therefore loads of freshly hatched seed ticks. But it was late summer and we were both bored with staying on the safe trails. At this point the best solution is wrapping a very tacky tape around and pulling them off.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Nope, nope, I'd friggin move states


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## brino (Oct 20, 2022)

RrhatBruce said:


> At this point the best solution is wrapping a very tacky tape around and pulling them off.





savarin said:


> Holy cow I would freak out at that load.





TorontoBuilder said:


> Nope, nope, I'd friggin move states




.......for me that depends.... is that an arm, or a leg or much, much worse ??????


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## RrhatBruce (Oct 20, 2022)

brino said:


> .......for me that depends.... is that an arm, or a leg or much, much worse ??????


Just my ankle. You can see the lines of ticks matching up with the lines of my sock ribbing. At least the newly hatched seed ticks have less chance of carrying disease.


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## savarin (Oct 20, 2022)

I think I prefer living with poisonous spiders, snakes, box jellyfish, crocodiles, sharks, blue ring octopus, cone shells, stone fish, bull ants, giant centipedes, cassowaries and drop bears.


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## TorontoBuilder (Oct 20, 2022)

savarin said:


> I think I prefer living with poisonous spiders, snakes, box jellyfish, crocodiles, sharks, blue ring octopus, cone shells, stone fish, bull ants, giant centipedes, cassowaries and drop bears.


wife has a childhood friend who lives in Sydney. She has visited us many times, stayed for months. We wont go to the land of horrors...


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## graham-xrf (Oct 21, 2022)

savarin said:


> I think I prefer living with poisonous spiders, snakes, box jellyfish, crocodiles, sharks, blue ring octopus, cone shells, stone fish, bull ants, giant centipedes, cassowaries and drop bears.


You left out poisonous bite cane toads.


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## graham-xrf (Oct 21, 2022)

RrhatBruce said:


> This year's personal best.  All because I foolishly let the dog talk me into a trail I knew would have tall grass, and therefore loads of freshly hatched seed ticks. But it was late summer and we were both bored with staying on the safe trails. At this point the best solution is wrapping a very tacky tape around and pulling them off.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Yup - chemical warfare is a definite option here.
Tacky tape?
DucK tape, Gorilla tape, feeble masking tape, all have the possibility of (literally) tearing your hair out!


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## savarin (Oct 21, 2022)

graham-xrf said:


> You left out poisonous bite cane toads.


no, they're only poisonous if you bite them.
I did leave out sand flies, their bites itch for over a week with me.


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## vtcnc (Oct 21, 2022)

graham-xrf said:


> Yup - chemical warfare is a definite option here.
> Tacky tape?
> DucK tape, Gorilla tape, feeble masking tape, all have the possibility of (literally) tearing your hair out!


A small price to pay. And you are more aerodynamic as an added benefit.


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## vtcnc (Oct 21, 2022)

Dabbler said:


> You have an open invitation to visit Calgary any January.  You may get +20C or you may get -35C.  Either way, you only have to wait a day or 2....


+20C in January? Sign me up for that. I'll just stay inside with my shorts and flip flops on for the rebound.


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## Dabbler (Oct 22, 2022)

vtcnc said:


> +20C in January?


yeah.  we get Chinook winds, which usually last a day or 2.

Typical daytime is  about -15C to -20C

One Christmas we had a sustained Chinook that lasted 2 weeks.  People were golfing on temporary greens on boxing day.


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