Posted on 06/16/2014 8:41:55 PM PDT by blam
Ted Siefer
June 16, 2014
Deer ticks, also known as blacklegged ticks, are the prime carriers of Lyme disease, which is particularly common in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic.
Large numbers of ticks, the parasites that carry Lyme disease, are expected to emerge in New England in the coming weeks, experts said on Friday.
Abundant snow over the winter and a wet spring have created ideal conditions for ticks to come out in the warm weather and try to latch onto hosts, they said.
"The next three to four weeks is the peak season of risk," said Sam Telford, an infectious disease professor at Tufts University and an authority on Lyme disease.
"That's when the nymphal ticks emerge and appear in large numbers. It's going to be gangbusters the next few weeks," Telford said.
The nymphs, some as small as a period in a newspaper, are much harder to detect than the full-grown ticks more commonly seen in the fall.
At a site he monitors on Nantucket, Telford found twice the number of ticks last week as he did last year.
The University of Rhode Island, which operates the Tick Encounter Resource Center, has placed its tick alert level at red, or high, for the entire Northeast and Mid-Atlantic region based on reports from a network of tick surveyors.
Lyme disease is caused by bacteria carried by the blacklegged tick, commonly known as the deer tick. Early symptoms include headache, muscle pain and fatigue, and in some cases a tell-tale bullseye rash.
The incidence of Lyme disease continues to rise in the region. New Hampshire health authorities reported nearly 1,700 cases of Lyme disease last year and the state now has the nation's highest incidence of the disease per 100,000 people, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control
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(Excerpt) Read more at businessinsider.com ...
Mosquitoes are really bad this year too. I was just up in Michigan and I was nearly eaten alive.
If you think you were bit, jump in a bathtub w/ at least 4 cups equal parts of baking soda and epsom salts, stay submerged to your neck for at least half an hour and continually dunk your hair and face.
No wonder mortality rates were so high before they discovered Lyme disease.
It's Always Something. (IAS)
U.S. Officials Keep Close Eye On ‘Miserable’ Mosquito-Borne Chikungunya Virus
I had one of those on my ankle last year. Didn't know it till I rubbed my ankle and felt something hard (picture rubbing a fish against the scales) that's what it felt like. I removed it and showed it to my doctor. He thought it was a gnat and didn't take me seriously till I said I had to pull it off. Said to return if a bulls eye appears.
Anyway, that thing was super tiny! How in the blazes are we supposed to find them on our pets?
There is a Providence that protects idiots, drunkards, children and the United States of America.
“....ideal conditions for ticks to come out in the warm weather.”
Chalk up another one for Global Warming /s
Short of DDT, what area sprays could one hit their property with to cut down the tick population, hypothetically?
I know they do something like this up in Canada to keep the ticks from killing the moose population there. There must be something available on the market that could be sprayed into treelines and bushes to knock down the ticks.
Ideally, this would be a 1-2-3 effort, where the ticks are knocked down now, and then in 4-5 months, something else gets sprayed to destroy any eggs, and then next spring yet a third chemical gets put out just after snowmelt to kill any nymphs that might have survived the other two.
Icecaps melting
oceans rising
oceans turning acidic
El Nino
Hurricanes
Tornadoes
Drought
Floods
Earthquakes
Muslim Terrorists
Why sweat the small stuff?
I remember my old man had a motorized fogger for mosquitoes up at our cabin - up until the mid-seventies. Not sure if it was DDT or not. I’m guessing there must be something that can be used. There are cans of “Off” that are foggers - so perhaps there is something for ticks.
This really ticks me off!
Here in the city I’m living in in India, the fancy resort hotel down the road has a team of gardeners that canvass their property every evening with backpack foggers to knock down the mosquito population.
From what I’m reading online, it’s either Permethrin or a related product, and most of the write-ups are all framed from the perspective of “ooh, I really don’t want to use chemicals so I can be organic” and how these products aren’t *that* bad.
Thing is, I *WANT* bad. I don’t really care about being “organic” or “low-impact”. I want something really horrific that I can have the pest company fog into my treeline 3 or 4 times over a period of a month or so, and I won’t have to worry about my kid contracting Lyme disease if she plays hide-and-seek in there. I’ll wash the stuff from my garden thoroughly, and we won’t go play in the woods for a day or so after each treatment, if that’s what it takes.
Pyrethrum or a synthetic variant such as Permethrin. But for God's sake find out all the critters that this stuff kills before you go spraying it around your yard and kill your daughter's cat.
Deer ticks
___________________________
not just deer ticks but White Tailed Deer Ticks
The widespread use of permethrin is actually making the bugs become resistant and is harmful to small kids. DDT would be the best, but in our case Thieves oil packs a punch. There is also peppermint oil, cinnamon oil all atomized and the bugs hate the smell, Lemongrass is awesome, that is what citronella is made from.
I am chemically sensitive, so yes, I do the organic route.
But , I do agree about DDT. Just let me know when it is legal again so I can and bunker for a few weeks!
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