Tick Advice

Well, I have said over and over that we have never had ticks, and have controlled fleas successfully with Advantage. I lied. We have ticks now. I have only found one on Honey and one on Lilly, but guess who has had more? Me http://PetoftheDay.com/talk/eek.gif !!!!! I know that is gross, but yesterday, I found one in my hair, and today, one behind my ear. They were not attached, thank goodness, but I almost feel like taking a Benadryl because of the creepy itching feeling I am experiencing.

I'm going to take back my unopened box of Advantage to the vet tomorrow, and get Frontline instead. And I have to buy it for two cats and two BIG dogs.

Here's my question. How do the rest of you handle treating your yard and home? I just want to do the right thing for the animals instead of tossing chemicals down in the yard. I have a newly sodded lawn, where there has been no grass before, and also all of my beds have recently been replinished with pinestraw instead of mulch. Could this be contributing to the problem?

Again, I've only seen 4, none on the cats, and no more on the dogs that I can see or feel, and I have checked them thoroughly. But when they are on me, and possibly could get on Helen, then I MUST do something.

Any advice would be welcome.

Thanks. Logan

Logan, I share your concern about ticks. The east coast region of australia where we live is notorious for its ticks...especially in the summer. We have been told that ticks are not just on the ground but that they can be blown in by the wind & fall from the trees above. It's said that they are prevalent on the wildlife that are in our gardens & bush & park areas...but that creatures like possums are immune to their toxin. But they're deadly to domestic animals.
We spray our dogs with Frontline, they take an internal medication called Proban, & I keep an insect repellent handy to spray onto any tick that should attach itself. I'm also considering getting one of the tick collars.
Our dogs have never been poisoned by a tick but one of our cats had to be treated. Some of our friends have had 2, 3 or more tick emergencies with their dogs over the summer.
I give a quick comb over to our 2 shelties & 1 tibbie every day during the tick season so I'd be aware if a tick had attached itself. Then I spray it with the insect repellent.
One of our big universities is doing a major research project on ticks. I'll see if I can find a link for you to find this information.

Logan, I've found the site maintained by the authority on ticks at Sydney uni.
Go to http://members.ozemail.com.au/~norbertf
Scroll down to heading Medicine of Ixodes holocyclus. Then click on sentence starting .Prevention. The section that comes up covers things like avoidance, searching, products etc.
You'll also see Pet First Aid and also 'Natural Remedies'.

In my area we are swimming in ticks. I have had Lime Disease over 4 times and now I have Cronic Lime. My cat comes in with over 10 ticks each day. Frontline only keeps the ticks from biting my cat but they still crawl on her and she leaves them in the house. So right now we can't even let her in the house. Tomarrow she's getting a lion hair cut since she has long hair. I haven't found any solutions yet

Hi Logan, In my favorites I have a site
called Vetinfo, I think the e.mail address
is http://www.vetinfo.com
and under alphabetical index there is information about ticks and advice by a
Vet. You might look it up and see if there is any advice that could help you.
We don't have a tick problem here, but it is probably only a matter of time.
Jackie

I adopted my Golden Retriever, Sandy, in March 1999, from the local Humane Society, at the age of approx. 6 or 7 mos. When he came home, he brought ticks with him. I don't know why they didn't find them on him. Not well versed in ticks at the time, I just picked them off and bathed him.

Three weeks later he was very depressed looking, started vomiting and was running a high fever. The vet said he had gotten a disease from ticks. He was medicated, cuddled a lot, and got well after several days.

Right after we got him my mother became very ill. We then had to keep him in the yard because the situation became grave and because my mother was at home, she had to be the priority. Sadly, she passed away two months after we got him. With our home situation so intense, my only respite during that time was to sit out in the yard with Sandy on a lawn lounge chair and love him up.

On occasion I would find a few other ones on him. Not realizing the result of just a few, my yard suddenly became a raging tick factory, and I ended up spraying him all the time. Being on a oral preventitive and picking them off did no good, the problem had become too big. By the next day he would be covered again.

Luckily, our kitty Jasper never got any, nor did they get into the house.

After being in the yard, I would have to check myself. Often I would feel a little tickle as they crawled around on me. Yikes! Only once did one attach on, after we had been doing yard work. It didn't freak me out much because when you live in Hawaii, you get used to bugs of all kinds.

The two month period gave the ticks a good head start. About the same time my next door neighbor complained about a massive invasion of ticks too and I feared it had probably come from my yard. She hired a professional exterminator.

Other neighbors complained of the terrible summer of ticks too. I felt reassured they didn't all come from me when one day at the park near my house, a man, two kids and two dogs got out of a car. One a lab mix and one a small Golden Retriever mix. The dogs came running up to me, friendly as anything, and I petted them. Feeling bumpies on them both, I checked and they too were covered in ticks, many big FULL ones. The owner knew about the ticks, said they were hard to get rid of, and that they were from a distant neighborhood. Whew! Not guilty this time. So glad my pup was at the beach with my son. I felt sorry for those two dogs. Ever see a really big and full tick with little babies piggybacking on its back? Well I did.

We de-ticked Sandy and started keeping him in the house. We got tick yard spray from the vet, using a hose sprayer on the whole back yard. At the recommended time we resprayed. We would occasionally find one, but after the last spray we never had another problem. Last summer was almost tick free, as it is now. My dogs are on the oral preventitive Frontline, and the occasional tick is usually after a visit somewhere else.

I wish you lots of luck in getting rid of them. It takes a lot of work but is worth it when they're gone.

***P.S. Thanks Logan for the link to the Golden Retriever site. Don't remember which question you posted it on. My youngest son complained that I was online too much this weekend. They all think I have gone doggone nuts. They're right! Thanks again. ***