Best way to not get ticks

[Titan6]

Garlic works. Permethin works better. It is what the military issues now.

If the doctor suspects Lyme's he can give you a 7 or 10 day course of anti-biotics that can knock it out before it has a chance to take hold. Good luck I hope all is well with you.

 

[target1911]

If the doctor suspects Lyme's he can give you a 7 or 10 day course of anti-biotics that can knock it out before it has a chance to take hold. Good luck I hope all is well with you.

7 to 10 days wont cut it. I was givin a 28 day perscripton of antibiotics. And now I have to go back for more because the symptoms are coming back again. I finished my meds about 5 wks ago. I will say that it was 6 months from my first symptom till the day I found a doctor with brains to figure it out and get me tested.

We have a couple of dogs and during the summer I'll pull one or two off them every day.

I tried everything from spraying the yard to perscritions for the dogs. The ONLY thing that kept from getting ANY ticks was lightly sprinkling thier food with garlic powder everytime you feed them. Its CHEAP and it WORKS. BTW....Your beloved dogs can get Lyme too.

 

[Ohen Cepel]

Permethrin spray your clothes and wear DEET cream (Ultrathon made by 3M).

Those two are proven to work. I have no evidence of the other methods working.

The permethrin should not be smelled out by the deer if you do it well ahead of time, it bonds to the fabric and you're good to go.

 

[pinkymingeo]

Powdered sulfur in your socks, waistband, cuffs and collar. Oldest preventive there is, and it works.

 

[CajunBass]

I don't know why I didn't get Lyme's disease or RMSTF or something like that when I was a kid. I used to get hundreds if not thousands of tick bites fishing around the ponds and creeks down home. I guess those diseases hadn't been invented yet. I don't know if they were deer ticks or what. We called 'em "seed ticks." Little bitty buggers.

We won't even talk about chiggers.

Now I pretty much stay out of the woods until cold weather.

 

[rwc]

ummm, ... hunt in MT when it's 20 degrees out?

 

[Buzztail]

I sat here and read this whole thread, and now I'm sitting here itching

 

[rdela29]

Variation of Lymes

A customer of mine has what's called Master's Disease - a variation of Lymes that is very hard to diagnose. This poor man went for years not knowing what he had - it took numerous specialists to nail it down. He suffers miserably. The worse part is his daughter acquired the same thing. He feels responsible - he says he called his little girl pup when she was young because she followed him into the woods all the time. He thinks her love for the outdoors is what ultimately led to the contraction.

He says it is spread a specific deer tick - not sure of the name. Said only a female with a white dot on her back carries the disease.

 

[Topkick]

avoiding ticks

Avoiding ticks(from an article by a fellow from south Texas)
"Some folks have ticks only in the warmer seasons, we here in south Texas have them year round. The following is how we deal with them;
1- 1/8th teaspoon sulphur(available at the local pharmacy) daily mixed with molasses/honey for one week.

2- the same routine once every other day for one week.

3- the same routine once each week for one month.

4- then once each month for the tick season.

I tried it, it works. they will get on but will NOT stick. Mosquitoes do not seem to care for it either. The taste will not be noticed if mixed in a tablespoon of molasses/honey.

 

[blkbrd666]

Odorless garlic pills??? Powdered sulfur in your socks??? Geez, I wish my parents had known about those! I had to eat a teaspoon of powdered sulfur straight out of the little can/box every so often in the summertime when I was a kid...YYYYYUUUUUUUCCCCKKKK!!!!! You know how hard that is to swallow dry?...and how nasty it is to wash down? They say the soles of the feet are a great way to absorb anything though, so I guess that makes sense. We did squeeze fresh onion juice in somebody's shoes when I was in college...he had onion breath for days until he threw away the shoes.

 

[Supertac45]

Sounds like a wood tick. Not really a big deal since as far I can find out, they don't carry Lyme Disease.

 

[lesterg3]

Lot's of ticks in SC, but the garlic and vinegar trick works great for both ticks and skeeters. I never get bit by either.

 

[bdg146]

Not sure about Permethrin (never used it) but I have a hard time using deet when hunting due to its odor.

My trick, which has (knock on wood) worked for the past 5-6 years when they started getting really bad is:

1) Tuck everything in. Tuck in layers. Tuck a shirt into your long underwear. Then tuck a shirt into your pants. Then have a shirt hanging down over your pants. Tuck your base layer into your boots, then put your outer pants over your boots. That way, the tick is going to have to skillfully navigate through many layers before ever finding bare skin to bite. Of course, this is difficult when it's warm out.

2) Avoid high grass or any type of brush.

3) Check often. 99% of the time a tick gets on me, I find it from my waist down. I check often. They generally don't move too fast when they first get on you. If you're tree stand hunting check as soon as you get there. Check on your walk in and out (we all need breaks from walking). Every time you have a chance, check.

4) The above are mostly for when I don't have this stuff available, but Scent Shield makes a great tick repellent. It's called "No Stinkin' Ticks". They make an unscented version that carries little scent (to me anyway). Can deer smell it? It doesn't seem like they can. Only downside there is it's expensive and sometimes hard to find. I've never found a tick on my clothing when using it. And no, I don't work for them

I almost picked up some odorless garlic pills one time to try them out on mosquitos. So they really work? What's the schedule with those? Do you take them constantly? Start taking them a week before hunting? I'll have to give them a go.

 

[alsaqr]

I hunt in some of the most tick infested places in the USA every month of the year. Been taking odorless garlic capsules for 15 years. In that time i have found two ticks on my bare skin. One was dug in and the other was trying to get away.

 

[bdg146]

I just checked the bottle, and the Scent Shield stuff has Permethrin in it. What other products contain Permethrin? Is it generally odorless?

 

[kilo729]

FYI guys, Permethrin is highly toxic to cats! So be careful if you're a cat owner. It's also classified by the EPA as a potential carcinogen.

 

[orphanedcowboy]

Sawyer Duranon Permethrin Insect Repellent


Use the wash in and your set, no more ticks, or sand fleas, or chiggers.

This was recommended to our group prior to deploying and it flat works. The wash in is suppose to last upwards of six weeks depending on the number of washes. I never noticed any odor either.

 

[trickshot]

My body is like a magnet for ticks and I have tried various things with little success.
Then a couple years ago I bought some flowers of sulphur, put some in an old sock, tied it off and dust myself with it all over real good every time I walk in the fields and woods. Also every day I eat a tiny little dab of it. Since doing this I have never had a single tick on my skin. I like that it does not have any strong smell like all the insect repellents do, and its inexpensive.

 

[cleardiddion]

Definitely changing your diet helps.

Healthy doses of garlic and onions I've found helps keep a number of parasites off, including ticks and mosquitos.

Definitely avoid eating a lot of sweet items before heading out and you should be peachy.

 

[redneck2]

Healthy doses of garlic and onions I've found helps keep a number of parasites off, including ticks and mosquitos.

I would imagine your love file suffers a little...

unless that's the parasites you're talking about. I've been married to some of them...

 

[zt77]

wow i had no idea this many people were scared of ticks.
here in OK ticks are everywhere. just pull them off and forget about it. if you see any type of rash, get it checked out though that's rare.

however, since in the summer time you can pick up around 50 just walking through tall grass, i drink two tablespoons of vinegar a day, diluted of course.
surely a big tough hunter could tough it out?

 

[kilo729]

Big tough hunters aren't fans of big tough Lyme Disease.

 

[Dr. Tad Hussein Winslow]

Like they said, permethrin (spelling?) is the best way, and its sold under a variety of brand names including Permanon - you can find a similar product at any hunting/fishing/camping store, and probably even Walmart.

But, be sure to USE PERMETHRIN AS DIRECTED - it is *poisonous* to put it directly on your skin. You have to spray the clothes you will be wearing (all of them), and then let them dry completely before putting them on (have to plan one or two days ahead of time). Make sure to spray a hat, too, in case they drop on your head. Tuck your pants into your boots, add a little bit of deet/off to the face/neck for good measure and you're off to the races.

Garlic does help a little too, though it's not a surefire thing, I don't think - I take a garlic supplement and one time the horseflies were just *killing* my buddy, and they mostly left me alone. I presume ticks would be similar.

Have no idea about the sulpher or vinegar, but they sound promising.

Yes, deer can smell deet/off, and can smell the permanon, too, so in the early season, you just have to use the wind. Having said that, the dried permanon is not going to smell nearly as strong as the deet/off, so if you use the former without the latter, you can perhaps fare a little better if the wind is agin' ya, and it will work BETTER than just deet/off only, as far as ticks are concerned.

What to do if you get them ANYWAY is not asked by the OP, but has been covered pretty well here nevertheless.

Oh yeah, get treated NOW by a Doc, in case you have lyme or other disease.

 

[308win]

What - exactly - is flowers of sulfur and where does one get it - pharmacy, verterinarian supplies, nutrition store? Or, can you just get plain old sulfur?

 

[driftrider]

I've always heard that wearing panty hose will keep the ticks off. Okay, no, I never tried it, let's get that out of the way right now. I would imagine, though, that Dennis Rodman might not have a lot of problems with ticks.

They also keep sand fleas from eating you alive, too. Seriously, though, given the choice between pantyhose and Lyme disease, which one are you going to choose? Personally, I wear microfabric tights as my base layer when hunting in the cold. They keep me warm and dry, and they don't bunch up and itch like long-johns do, and you can get ones made for men that are 1/3 the cost of Under Armor, which are really just glorified and overpriced mens tights. I know which way I swing, my wife knows I wear them, and I personally don't give a hoot what others think. No one will ever see them anyway.

As for the garlic and sulfur...um, garlic I'd do, but ingesting large quantities of sulfur just doesn't seem like a very good idea to me. The permethrin is supposed to work good, but the brands that I tried do definitely smell. If I can smell the stuff, the deer sure can. Again, though... stink like bug spray, or get lyme disease? Not a tough question.

Mike