TICKS

[williamlayton]

This isn't a poll exactly---it is more of a tail.
I remember gettin ticks back in the day when it wasn't a big thing, but the worse biting I ever got was from a buch of---i don't know what you boys called 'em---seed ticks.
Them little bitty ol black things.
I was about 15, I guess, anywho it was about the time of that Red Sea parting. Me and some fellers went out to the Rocky Creek hunting Club--on the old Bold Springs road---you know where it is--or you don't---it is under water now.
Spend the night, swimmin, doin stuff--you know.
There was a swimmin hole, down an old logging road, in the Kickapoo creek----everybody has a kickapoo creek, don't they?  It twas about a mile. I kept feeling sumthin on my legs---wearin shorts. Looked down, I thought, "I'm turnin black."
Those little things was all over me---even got up to my privates.
I have never itched so much in my life---nothing--not even coal oil took it over. Yea--I put the coal oil on my B's---it couldn't do any more damange that was bein done by those ticks.
It took two days for the itch to go away.
Lordy---I know women say they don't remember the pang of childbirth-----BUT---I REMEMBER THOSE TICKS.
Blessings   

[Slowhanddd]

I remember gettin' chiggers when i was little.Used to stay with my Great-Grand parents in Missouri.My Granny had some hellishous stuff called white linament.She'd put that stuff on my chigger bites and my Granddad would tell me I could catch a rabbit the way I ran around.Must of been 5-6 years old.Still remember the burn on the nether regions.Stepped on a bumble bee once and he healed the sting with his chaw of tobacco.Tied up with his handkerchief.Slow

[rockbilly]

ONce while fishing I had a nature call, I beached the boat, grabbed a roll of paper and and found me a place to squat.  That night I begin to itch, I grabbed a bottle dishwashing liquid and went to the lake for a bath, it didn't help but I managed to ssuffer through the night. Since I had already paid my entry fees for the bass tournament I fished all day the following day, when I got home that evening I was coverd with bites from my neck lind down to my shoes.  The next few days were misaberable, but soaking in bleach water helped relive the itch so I survived.

[wareagleguy]

Yea, I guess every state has something that will get you.  Alaska might have the mighty bears but just stand in the middle of a chigger patch!!!

[Sourdough]

Hat, I remember chiggers and ticks from when I was a kid back in Tennessee.  Glad we don't have them here in Alaska.  But we do have lice and scabbies.  Have gotten them from trapping.

[DDZ]

Parts of the north east have plenty of ticks. If I go huntin and its above 35 degrees I use a repellent with lots of deet in it, or a permethrin based repellent. Mainly for deer ticks. In mid to late spring deer ticks hatch out, and when they are in the nymph stage they are almost impossible to see, but they can carry the lyme bacteria. Adult deer ticks are also hard to detect but are more noticeable. they are still nowhere close to the size of a dog tick which does not carry lyme decease, but can carry other disease's.

   Ticks have a knack for crawling on your skin with out you being able to feel them. Also most of the time you can't feel the bite either. They crawl until they find a warm area, like under arm pits, crotch area, and in your hair on your scalp. They attach and feed on your blood until full, then drop off. Lyme disease is something you don't want to get. I was treated for lyme for one year with oral antibiotics, including six weeks of intravenous with a pick line. This was 12 years ago. I still have the lyme bacteria but I guess my immune system kind of controls it. I have had to take two, four month periods of antibiotics since I was first treated. The last one was about a year ago.

If caught early Lyme can be beat. 40% of people that get lyme never notice the bulls eye rash around a bite. Or notice a tick attached to them. I guess I fell into the forty percent. If you would happen to see a bulls eye rash, I would get a one month prescription of antibiotics. Most doctors only want to give a one or two week prescription. Believe me there are not many doctors that know how to treat lyme or know anything about it. Or are there insurance companies that let doctors treat it the way it should be. If you do have a deer tick attached, remove it with a very small pair of tweezers, as close to the skin as possible then send it to a lab that will test it for lyme.
The best repellents to use are permethrin based, and kill ticks on contact. These repellents are not to be used on skin, just clothing. A couple brands are Duranon, Repel Peromanone, and Cutter Outdoorsman Gear guard. Deet based can be used on skin, but do not kill ticks they are just a repellent. Its also a good idea to keep your pants tucked in your boots.

I have a hard time spring gobbler hunting anymore, sitting on the ground, without thinking about ticks crawling up my back. If fact I don't do much spring gobbler hunting any more because of this thought.         

[Redtail1949]

took my wife down to texas to see the folks 25 years ago. just had to take her camping on the sandbars on the neches river and set out trot lines. well somewhere along the line probably taking her to see a special place where there were huge old oaks that somehow had missed the timber cutters. she picked up a few ticks. i got all that i could see to back out with a cigarette. about two days later she started showings big hugh red sploches behind her knee. took her to the doctor and sure enough she started having bad bad headaces terrible aching joints and fevers. to make it short she still suffers bouts of "Tick Fever 25 years later and no telling how many doctors and specialist.

[Sourdough]

When I was a kid we got into ticks all the time.  Mom never told us what to do for them.  Dad was never around.  So we first just pulled them off.  Then the site would get infected and swell up.  My Grandfather saw one of the infected spots, knew what had happened and showed us what to do.  Next time we got ticks we went to him and he helped us out.  He showed us how to use a match or lighter to get them to turn loose.  If that did not work, he showed us how to use our pocket knives.  How to slide the point of the blade in just below the head, and pop the head out.  Then wipe the site with kerosene to prevent infection.  Worked for us, but the Kerosene was worse than the knife.

I was always checking my little brothers for ticks after that.  All I had to do was take my pocket knife out and they would start squalling.

[williamlayton]

Good stories guys.
Blessings

[Old Fart]

I remember way back when my brothers and I were kids. My dad took us hunting down between Cloudy and Moon Oklahoma. It's almost completely down in the very southeast corner of the state. We stayed at an old deer camp.  We drove a good long ways on old dirt roads that barely had two tire track visible. There were a couple of old ran down cabins we stayed in. Just about enough siding to slow down the winter breeze.  Paint was still visible in a few spots on the exterior. Weeds had grown up well above the windows in a few spots, no telling what creatures lived in that jungle. The camp was situated between a couple of the little mountain ranges down there. They weren't anything like the Rocky's mind you, but to a bunch of big eared country boys they looked like the Rocky's. We spent the rest of the first day out running around the backwoods with our 22's shooting at everything that appeared to be edible. We got a few tree rats and brought them back to camp where we skinned them and hung them over a open fire our dad had made to warm his bones on. I have to admit we were all pretty happy to see that fire as it had gotten dark and it gets cold in a hurry down there in those hills when the sun crosses over and dissapears. Well to make an already to long of a story shorter the next morning when we woke up we were covered in ticks. Seems the deer camp owner didn't seem to think maintainence or upkeep was a high priority. Fortunately dad had brought some thing to help eliminate tick from the body just in case. We were literally covered from head to toe. We still laugh about that when we get together.

[Elijah Gunn]

I grew up in Michigan where there are so few ticks I'd never even heard about them. Then we moved to Missouri and I became acquainted with the little buggers. The first one I ever found on myself was in the shower. I felt a little bump on the back of my thigh, I tugged on it but it seemed stuck. Since it didn't hurt to pull it I tugged harder, and it popped out. I looked between my fingers and saw it's little legs moving,it was somewhat traumatic. Just gross!
After dealing with 5 or 6 more during the next couple weeks I was able to get used to them. Any time I was outside I would check myself over, especially if I had walked through any tall grass. The kids got a bedtime inspection every day. I'd just pull them out with tweezers getting down around the ticks head as close as possible.
It really helped me to learn about ticks in order to not be freaked out about them. I finally got to the point where I could usually feel when one was crawling on my skin.
We had chiggers too. They would get on our ankles mostly, and sometimes settle in around the belt line. Very itchy ,and chiggers are so small they can't usually be seen by the naked eye. Rubbing alcohol takes away most of the itch chiggers give.

[Sourdough]

The best thing for chiggers I found was clear finger nail polish.  Polish with color in it would work if you don't mind every one looking at you funny.  Just paint over the the chigger at night, and in the morning it would be gone.  Due to the lack of air they suffocate.

[williamlayton]

TERMS

What are CHIGGERS---RED BUGS---SEED TICKS?
I don't know what a chigger is, we didn't use the term. I suspect they are what we called red bugs or maybe seed ticks.

I know the difference between red bugs and seed ticks---but I really don't know what chiggers are.
Blessings

[Datil]

 Chiggers and red bugs are the same devils.
 Wheen I was in service at Camp Poke La. every I was covered with
 red buggs from my shorts to my ankles/

 Datil

[streak]

 Chiggers and red bugs are the same devils.
 Wheen I was in service at Camp Poke La. every I was covered with
 red buggs from my shorts to my ankles/

 Datil

10-4 on that! I spent two summers down many years ago in training and not only were chiggers a problem but the pesky sand fleas on the rifle range!!

[GH1]

Plenty of chiggers here in Arkansas, I got bit up pretty bad last summer.  I'm sure they go by different names in different parts of the country, but no matter where you are or what you call them, they SUCK.
GH1

[Elijah Gunn]

TERMS

What are CHIGGERS---RED BUGS---SEED TICKS?
I don't know what a chigger is, we didn't use the term. I suspect they are what we called red bugs or maybe seed ticks.

I know the difference between red bugs and seed ticks---but I really don't know what chiggers are.
Blessings

Ticks go through 3 phases in their life cycle.
1st they hatch from eggs. In this stage they are called SEED TICKS and they are VERY small , about the size of a period on a printed page. They find a host to latch onto, and have their first feeding of blood.
2nd phase they have grown a little bigger,they find a second host to suck some blood out of,and again they grow a little bigger.
3rd phase. The tick is now mature and will feed one more time before it mates and finishes it's life cycle.

Chiggers, I've heard them also called "no see ums" because basically they can't be seen by the naked eye. They get on you and dispense their digestive juices onto your skin which they then lap up. That is what makes them soooo itchy.

[williamlayton]

Funny about regional terms.
The first time I heard them called chiggers was when I was small. I wondered what they were and why we didn't have any.
later i thought Chiggers and Red Bugs were the same thing but somebody said no and, well, i been confused, but i guess i was right.
Those little things are a pain--as are seed ticks---glad to get that information about them.
That coal oil got em off but it didn't have and itch stopper and I wasn't at home. Used what we had--coal oil.
I can still feel those things itching.
Blessings

[Sourdough]

Like I said before Clear Finger Nail polish.  Take the polish and paint over the chigger.  5 to 10 minutes and the itch stops, then go to bed.  Tomorrow it is gone.