Know Your Ticks…And Understand The Diseases
Back in the days of my youth wood ticks were nothing more than a nuisance of spring and early summer…but somewhere along the way as I got older things seemed to get a whole lot more complicated with these little buggers. Indeed, the common wood tick is becoming a 21st Century menace of dangerous proportions to outdoors folks in many areas of the country.
As a kid, I knew of the dangers from the creepy crawly little pest. We knew it transferred Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever…but the fact is to a small child in rural Minnesota my chances of contracting this ailment seemed about as likely as my parents traveling to Vegas and winning enough money to pay off the farm mortgage. Sure it could happen…but the odds were simply too astronomically high to really worry about this health malady.
Such is certainly not the case today. In fact, the more we learn about the common wood tick (and its host of cousins, such as the deer tick, etc.) the more we discover that this pest is actually a carrier of some down-right nasty diseases. Diseases that left unrecognized could permanently debilitate you and at worse…could kill you.
In today’s Minneapolis StarTribune there’s a good article about a deputy sheriff in Northern Minnesota who had a triple whammy, of sorts. This poor individual came so close to dying as a result of ticks that it’s truly a miracle he’s still alive today. Check it out by linking here.
For the balance of today’s blog, I want to review the different diseases these ticks carry and also highlight some of the more common symptoms (by linking to the disease). I’m not going to harp on preventative measures…as I think we all know what needs to be done. Check! Check! Check! Also liberally use some of the great repellents much like you would spray your clothes for mosquitoes.
The common tick-borne diseases include (sourced from webMD.com):
- Lyme disease. Symptoms usually start 1 to 4 weeks after the tick bite, with up to 90% of people developing an expanding, circular red skin rash.
- Rocky Mountain spotted fever. Symptoms usually start 3 to 12 days (average 7 days) after the tick bite.
- Tularemia. Symptoms usually start within 21 days (average 1 to 10 days) after the tick bite or other exposure.
- Ehrlichiosis. Symptoms usually start from 1 to 21 days (average of 7 days) after the tick bite.
- Relapsing fever. Symptoms usually start 3 to 11 days (average of 6 days) after the tick bite.
- Colorado tick fever. Symptoms usually start within 14 days (average of 3 to 6 days) of the tick bite.
- Babesiosis. Symptoms usually start 1 to 6 weeks after the tick bite
The important thing is to remove the ticks promptly and carefully. There are many good methods for doing this…but most often you want to remove the ENTIRE tick. Don’t use a match to burn the tick. Likewise, rubbing nail polish or Vaseline on the tick does not always result in an effective, clean removal. Finally, be sure to thoroughly wash the infected area with soap.
My technique of choice is to simply grab the tick and apply gentle, constant pressure pulling away from site of attachment. I don’t pull too hard so that the tick’s head breaks off and remains attached to the skin. Instead, my main goal is to play a sort of tug-o-war type of game with the tick hoping that eventually it will lose its grip. If it takes a minute or two to accomplish this…so be it. In this case patience is a virtue when it comes to proper tick removal.
Sometimes I wonder if ticks are actually carrying more diseases these days or if through the marvels of medical science we are simply discovering more tick-borne illnesses we never knew previously existed. Whatever the case…if you’re a sportsman who spends time in tick country you owe it to your good health to do a complete inspection after every outing. Might I recommend taking an opposite-sex buddy with you that you might later want to get naked with…it makes the tedious task of finding ticks a lot more fun.
© 2005 Jim Braaten. All Rights Reserved. No Reproduction without Prior Permission.