http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/upshot/ticks-season-coming-ll-bug-spring-213325176.html

I am glad you found and posted this. A group of us got swarmed with ticks while hiking the Chuck Keiper Trail in PA a couple weeks ago (though the kilted ones, myself included, bore the brunt). I pulled off twenty of the little vampires (eight of whom were embedded to a certain extent) and another backpacker with us found 33 on him over the duration of the weekend.

I have noticed they are pretty bad in Ohio already also.

I brought a friend out for her first overnight trip in the woods three weeks ago here in Iowa. She got a tick on the back of her shoulder, it was unknown for a day or two. She pulled it off her self and didnt keep it to ID. She went to the Dr who started her on antibiotics due to a circular rash at the bite area. My grand daughter was along and she and me didnt get any. The Dr couldnt believe she picked up a tick in the beginning of march already. Its gonna be a bad year so I would recommend treating your clothes with permetherin and using deet on exposed areas

Edited by mtmnmark on 03/31/2012 08:38:14 MDT.

I flicked dozens of ticks off me a few weeks ago while hiking out here, and that was only within a few hours.

Permethrin

Sometimes you just have to.

Deet

You'll be glad you did.

Ken agreed, I would never have done poisons like this in the past, but the tick born diseases can kill you, or ruin your life, permethrin seems a pleasant option in comparison. No joking matter those. Remember, never assume you have no bite if you see no tick, and never assume you got no infection if you see no rash.

tickborne diseases besides lyme

I was afraid that exactly what this new article and posters here report, early spring, warming trends, earlier tick nymph onset.

Keep in mind, you cannot see tick nymphs, they are the size of a dot/period, and you are lucky to see the adults. Personally, I am unclear on how anyone going solo can actually check themselves for ticks, since they go to the spots that are almost impossible to check or see on your body, behind knees, armpits, etc. Another fine reason to never use a tent/tarptent without a full bug screen as far as I'm concerned.

50% or so of people never see, feel, or find the tick, which drops off by itself after a certain amount of time. Lyme infection can take place in under 24 hours, and can also have co-infections which if not diagnosed, and the odds are that they won't be, may not be solved by the initial antibiotic treatments. Keep in mind that precisely zero samples of ticks were taken from anywhere you will backpack, which means nobody knows what the infection rates are. For example, in Big Sur, the only places they have taken tick samples are in Andrew Molera state park, zero samples from inland, which is a totally unrelated ecosystem, epsecally higher up. I read one independent group is studying tick infections in Sonoma county, CA, and found up to 40% lyme infected tick nymphs, vs 1 or 2% reported by California or CDC.

If you get a weird fever after being outdoors, and if it does not go away after a few days, make sure to see a doctor, and insist on getting immediate antibiotic treatment. Lyme symptoms in varying stages of the disease. Common misdiagnosis, MS, arthritis, flu, meningitis. Average number of doctors consulted before incorrect diagnosis is corrected, 6 or 7.

Doctors are almost insanely incompetent when it comes to tick borne disease, especially out here in the west. And these diseases can ruin your life.

Places the ticks like to hang out: grasses, bushes, up to knee high, along trails to catch a ride/host, the leaves under some types of trees. Ticks do not jump, they crawl. It's a mystery to me how they can crawl onto a moving host however, seems almost magic. And they can wait for a host to come along for 6 months if I read it right.

Cowboy campers may want to reconsider and realize that things are changing in nature, it's reacting to our onslaught, what was ok 20 years ago might not be ok today.

Edited by hhope on 03/31/2012 13:06:30 MDT.

Time for some manscaping..

Ditto the Permethrin. Effective and safe as far as I can tell from everything I've read. Certainly safer than Lyme's disease. Certainly less distasteful than removing the beasties.

I was just out at Henry Coe and forgot to permethrine clothes prior. Rangers mentioned the ticks were heavy along certain trails so I was a bit concerned... but I think most of them must have ran away to the midwest or eastward because I didn't see a single one, which has got to be a first for me at Coe. That place seems to be a tick haven, and they like my blood.