Ticks

[homersipes]

I have had good luck with vicks vapor rub, or Vaseline, as said earlier it smothers them and cant breathe.  I have used vicks probably a dozen or so times and Vaseline a couple.  have also used a lighter, a match, tweezers.  they also make a tick remoal kit that has a tick remover.  looks like a wonder bars nail puller hole

[Fud]

Rock paper scissors as to who is gonna suck the poison out 

[scott66]

Rock paper scissors as to who is gonna suck the poison out 

NOT IT!!

[jimson]

Don't smear some stuff on it and wait for it to let go. The longer it's on you the better chance you get a tick bourne illness.

Just grab it as close to the skin as possible with tweezers and pull it straight out, don't twist it one way or another.

[DREDIOCK]

enjoy lyme disease

My son had it once. fortunately we caught it pretty early.
I have a customer who's wife ended up suffering neurological damage because it went undiagnosed for so long

[smoe]

Talk about consumming hot sauce, I wonder if hot sauce directly on the tick will do anything?

[cattb]

Don't smear some stuff on it and wait for it to let go. The longer it's on you the better chance you get a tick bourne illness.

Just grab it as close to the skin as possible with tweezers and pull it straight out, don't twist it one way or another.

yup as far as lymes disease goes, I have read both 48 and 72 hours it takes for the tick to transmit the disease. Just get tweezers and pull it out.Thats what I do anyway.

[Mano]

My son and I picked up some ticks riding horses though a rainforest a couple years ago while on vacation.  They can drop down from the trees and you don't feel them. Put a hot match near their abdomen and they will pull out. My doctor put us on antibiotics for a week as a precaution. The bites did swell up and it took about two weeks to go away. When you travel abroad you need to check the horse carefully before going for a ride. Have your doctor give you an antibiotic as you never know what disease they might be carrying.

<S>


There are tons of species, this just one found on dogs.

[maddafinga]

Two years ago I went camping on Memorial day and was bit by a tick that was infected with rocky mountain spotted fever bacteria.  About a week later I suddenly started getting VERY sick and had an extremely itchy red rash break out all over my body in the space of a couple of hours.  I had a bite on my forearm that didn't swell but got deeper and deeper purple and the ring of color grew to about the size of a quarter and itched like crazy.  I thought maybe it was a spider bite and I was having a severe histamine reaction.  The ER doc said, that doesn't look like a spider bite at all, but have you been bitten by any ticks recently? 

They gave me the specific antibiotic to knock out the bacteria, but it can be a deadly illness.  Even with the antibiotics, the rash and incredible itch lasted two more weeks.  I couldn't even sleep with a blanket on, felt like it was made of sandpaper. 

My point here is use Off, use the hell out of it, and reapply. Some things ticks have can very literally kill you.

[DubiousKB]

I get that you don't want an open flame near your arse.... Hell I think most people would agree on that 

But the best thing IMHO is heat. If you don't have the steady hands or a significant other for this grooming process, simply use a heated paperclip or other small metal object like the handle of a utensil. Heat it up until the metal is red hot and then simply hover the heated object over the tick (to avoid burning yourself) but even better is touching the tick with the heated object as they will react immediately, by releasing their bite.

The reason heat works better is the tick will pull it's head out of your skin due to the heat. If you pluck or pull ticks, there's a chance that their head will remain embedded in your skin, effectively increasing the odds of a tick borne disease.

Best thing to do is to ensure you do a "tick" check if you have been in areas known to the parasite. Like a few people said, the little buggers are not easy to detect and doing a thorough self-examination is key.

[jimson]

"Prompt removal of ticks decreases the chances of getting Lyme disease. The proper and easiest method is to grasp the tick with fine tweezers, as near the skin as you can, and gently pull it straight out. Be careful not to squeeze the tick when removing it which could result in more bacteria being injected.

 Do not try to remove the tick with your fingers or attempt to remove with lighted cigarettes, matches, nail polish, or Vaseline. Doing this causes the tick to regurgitate its stomach contents into your bloodstream. "

http://www.lymeticks.org/if-bitten

[MrRiplEy[H]]

"Prompt removal of ticks decreases the chances of getting Lyme disease. The proper and easiest method is to grasp the tick with fine tweezers, as near the skin as you can, and gently pull it straight out. Be careful not to squeeze the tick when removing it which could result in more bacteria being injected.

 Do not try to remove the tick with your fingers or attempt to remove with lighted cigarettes, matches, nail polish, or Vaseline. Doing this causes the tick to regurgitate its stomach contents into your bloodstream. "

http://www.lymeticks.org/if-bitten

Was just about to write that - it's the worst possible idea to try to suffocate the tick unless you especially want to get sick.

They sell tick lasso's which work very well for tick removal, even better than tweezers. You lasso the head of the tick, spin it around a couple of times and yank it off.



Oh and be sure to use home test kit for lymes disease or take it to the doctor to find out if you need antibiotics. Some ticks also carry a nasty meningitis virus which can either kill you or leave you paralyzed for life. My whole family was vaccinated against this this summer.