Beware the Deer Tick
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Deer ticks, in their adult stage are about the size of a sesame seed. You’ll often find deer ticks roaming well into fall, long after wood ticks have gone to bed for the season.

Nymphal stage deer ticks, the size of poppy seeds, are more prevalent in the spring and summer. Ticks don’t remain small very long when attached. As they become engorged with blood they get much bigger and they lighten in colour.

Deer ticks can carry a number of health-debilitating diseases, with Lyme Disease being the most well known. In their ‘later’ stages, tick borne diseases can attack and weaken every aspect of the human body from the heart to the nervous system to the joints and muscles. In its ‘early’ stages, The Canadian Lyme Disease Foundation’s website says the
symptoms of Lyme infection can be flu-like and may include fever, headache, fatigue, nausea, muscle ache, jaw pain, red eyes, and stiff neck.

You may experience symptoms very quickly after being bitten by a disease-carrying tick, or you may not develop problems until some time later. This occurs because the Lyme bacteria, called spirochetes, are spiral shaped, a form that allows them to burrow deep into tissues where they wait for opportune times to spread.

Because of the smallness of the deer tick, about 70% of the people bitten are not aware they’ve even been bitten. It’s also important to realize that almost 70% of people bitten never develop the bull’s eye rash.

Beware the deer tick! Prevention is the most effective and most important method in dealing with ticks. If the ticks cannot attach to you…

Repellants

• Deet. Yes, it’s smelly and strong but it does work.

• Geranium and palmarosa essential oil spray. Barbara Hall, of Lady Barbara’s Garden website, a writer and professional gardener, has had eight bouts of Lyme disease. As a result of her experiences, she has developed a Rose Geranium Tick Repellant that repels ticks rapidly. I’ve not yet had the opportunity to try this blend out myself. The spray is based on geranium and palmarosa essential oils. If you’re a do it yourselfer, the essential oils can be ordered online from Mountain Rose Herbs and the spray can be made using the following Basic Essential Oil Spray. (Note that geranium essential oil is contraindicated during pregnancy.)

Basic Essential Oil Spray Recipe: Fill a spray bottle with 1 cup of isopropyl alcohol, 1 cup of water, and 1/4 to 1/2 a teaspoon of essential oils. Adjust strength according to your preferences. To make smaller batches, just half or quarter the recipe. Easy conversion: 10 drops = 1/10 tsp, 12.5 drops = 1/8 tsp, and 25 drops = 1/4 tsp. Spritz yourself down with the blend before heading outside.

•
Mountain mint. In his book Green Pharmacy, herbalist Duke recommends using fresh mountain mint as a deterrent. You can find it at Richters Herbs. This mint readily overwinters in Zone 3. It is prone to powdery mildew, though.

General Prevention Methods

• Tuck your pants into your socks. And if possible wear light-coloured clothing so you are able to see the tick hitchhikers.

• Do daily tick checks. Scan the entire body, front and back, including groin creases, between toes, behind the ears, and in the hairline.

• If you are a hunter, minimize your contact with the deer hide and head. Ticks will hop off the cooling deerskin and latch onto you, your pets, or your family.

• Try some Ex Officio Buzz Off clothing. Ex Officio’s FAQ page says: BUZZ OFF™ Insect Shield Insect Repellent Apparel is a revolutionary new product that combines Permethrin, a man-made form of a natural insect repellent found in the Chrysanthemum plant, with a new patent pending process. BUZZ OFF™ apparel is the smart way to protect against annoying insects including those that can carry West Nile virus and other diseases.

• Carefully remove an attached tick. This is to reduce the chances of the tick regurgitating harmful bacteria into your body. The website Stop Ticks on People recommends:
  1. Using fine pointed tweezers, grasp the tick as close to the skin as possible without squeezing the tick’ s body.
  2. Firmly pull it straight out (expect to feel some resistance)….Be sure to note the date and site of the bite for future reference.
  3. NEVER: squeeze the tick, burn it, or cover it with Vaseline or any other substance.
  4. Remember to disinfect the site of the bite, wash your hands and disinfect your tweezers.
  5. Contact your doctor.

Please be careful because the tweezers can slip rather than grip. Not a scenario you want to see happen.

And remember that the above methods work only if you use them.

Having a deer tick latched onto you is kind of like playing Russian Roulette. Some deer ticks may carry disease and some may not. Prevention is best. However, if you do happen to get bitten quick treatment is imperative. Lyme and other tick borne diseases can be potentially life threatening. So if you have been bitten by a tick, have the bull’s eye rash, or are displaying unusual symptoms that are consistent with tick illness, get to the doctor as soon as possible.

Update: With the Canadian medical system (in my area, anyway), doctors will now treat immediately with a short session of antibiotics. This is quite different from the ‘wait and see if the tests eventually show something approach.’ By the time anything showed, the tick-borne illness had usually spread throughout the body.

Treatment Approaches
    • The medical system.
    • Teasel tincture. First put forth by Matthew Wood, though his site doth not mention it yet, so check out Matthew’ s The Book of Herbal Wisdom.
    • Joseph J. Burrascano Jr, MD (used by Naturopaths everywhere): Diagnostic Hints and Treatment.
    • Very bitter herbs, beware the Herksheimer reaction. Did someone say Ayahuasca?
    • The salt treatment, again beware the Herksheimer reaction. Someone is selling this remedy online, which basically recommends expensive salt pills made up at the pharmacist’ s. I don’t see why you can’t make them up more cheaply at home using pure salt, though I could be wrong. I’ ve seen the remedy help a lot but not cure. Go to LymePhoto.com for an in-depth discussion and free access to the remedy amounts and methods.
    • Check out Lady Barbara’s Garden website to read about her struggle through eight bouts of Lyme Disease and what she’ s learned treatment-wise.

    Lady Barbara
    allied w/ teasel



    Resource websites


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    Photo Credit: RawkU5

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