Deb D’Andrea, Nederland. Recently, I have read several posts on social media where people have mentioned they have found ticks crawling around their households, and on themselves and their pups. I was surprised the ticks were already out, especially with the last snow. Reading this news, I’ve begun the “tick-check” routine of brushing through my Girls fur after our hikes; along with a thorough check of myself. Fortunately, I haven’t discovered any ticks this year, and haven’t found more than two or three ticks in the over ten years I’ve lived here.

An interesting fact is that there are twenty-seven species of ticks in Colorado; with the most common ones being the Rocky Mountain wood tick, the American dog tick and the brown dog tick.  For us, ticks most commonly transmit Colorado tick fever and Rocky Mountain spotted fever, but there are other diseases listed in the link below. There have been no confirmed human cases of Lyme disease originating in Colorado versus the eastern United States, where Lyme is prevalent. 

Ticks may feed for several hours to several days and will often attach themselves in areas with little to no hair – like dog ears, their inner thighs, and between their toes and skin crevices or folds. The life span of a tick can be several months to years, with females laying hundreds to thousands of eggs at a time.

The sooner a tick is located and removed, the lower the opportunity for disease to be transmitted to us or our pups.  Symptoms of tick diseases include fever, lethargy, weakness, lameness, paralysis, joint swelling and/or anemia; and can take days, weeks or months to appear.  If you notice any of these signs in your dog, contact your vet immediately to begin testing and treatment.

There’s a great little tick tool I use, it’s the Coghlan’s 0015 Tick Remover Tool.  It has little grabbers that wrap around the tick body, pinches at the base between the tick and skin, and then you gently spin the tool, easily removing the complete tick. I’ve used this tool several times over the years, and it works awesomely. Obviously, a tick is more challenging to remove if it is located in an area where there’s a lot of fur or hair. I gently hold the fur or hair back and try to not get it wrapped up in the tool.  Since purchasing this tool years ago, I have yet to yank any skin or fur when removing ticks; and the few I’ve found on myself and removed using the tool has been basically painless.

For those of us outside adventurers, avoiding ticks is a challenge as they are abundant in spring and early summer in brushy fields and woodlands, and in commonly traveled grassy areas. They will climb up to perch, awaiting their victim, legs outreached ready to grab on and hitch a ride as the unsuspecting victim walks by. Ticks can take several hours to settle in and begin feeding – yuck!  This gives you time to do a tick check on yourself and your pets after a hike to find them before they attach.

For more tick information, visit:  https://extension.colostate.edu/topic-areas/insects/colorado-ticks-and-tick-borne-diseases-5-593/

There are several natural repellants, but I’m not going to get into that as there are too many opposing theories as to what works and what doesn’t work.  It’s best to make a choice that you’re comfortable with, try it out and see if it works for you and your pup.  I use DaisyPaw Debugged for myself and my pups, and there are several locals who blend their own concoctions to prevent getting bit. Stay well. 

Till next time. Deb D’Andrea, founder 4TheLuvOfDogz, Making Tails Wag Better since 2007; www.4theluvofdogz.com.

(Originally published in the June 4, 2020, print edition of The Mountain-Ear.)