It's Official: I'm Declaring War

[Bailey Guns]

War on ticks. The little bastards are on everything. We keep our dogs treated but they still hitch rides on them into the house before falling off...which might be anywhere. There must be millions of them around the property which is covered in brush, tall grasses and other vegetation. I keep the area around the house neat and tidy and the grass mowed but that's just not working. We've decided to resort to a chemical attack. I'm gonna spray an area completely around the house and the yard with permethrin to try to knock down the amount of ticks the dogs pick up. I wish I could hire a crop duster to just spray the entire area...they're that bad this year.

I'm also gonna make tick-tubes, spray some dedicated jeans, shirts, socks, shoes, hat, etc...to wear outside and try hard to make life miserable for the little bloodsuckers.

Anyone have any helpful tips for controlling them?

[ray1970]

And I thought everything was rosey in good old Idaho.

[ray1970]

Seriously though, when I used to live in a heavily wooded area we would spread some sort of white powder that would get rid of the ticks. I think it was lime(?) powder.

[theGinsue]

Wish I had some tips but I don't.

My parents property in rural MO is also saturated with ticks. NOTHING we tried would control them. We had beagles with flea/tick collars and every tme we'd let them back in the house we'd take about 75 ticks off of each of them before letting them pass out of the entry foyer. We's stick the ticks on straight pins to capture them and weeks later the bastards were still alive. Used to go through a lot of straight pins. I had a "kill jar" to kill insects for a required high school biology insect collection. Can't remember what the kill agent was but most things would die in minutes - but not the ticks, they'd thrive in the jar. The only up side was I got really good at removing embedded ticks from the skin without leaving the head in.

Good luck. After my experience with ticks I hate them more than spiders (this from a guy who was bit by a brown recluse).

[theGinsue]

Seriously though, when I used to live in a heavily wooded area we would spread some sort of white powder that would get rid of the ticks. I think it was lime(?) powder.

Can't use lme if there's any chance his dogs might get into it.

[Monky]

7 dust? If they still sell it.. use to cover the dogs in it growing up and put a perimeter around the house.. I think that's what it was called.


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[Bailey Guns]

I own property in MO. You're right about ticks there. It's far worse than here.

I'm hesitant to use permethrin even though I've seen how effective it is. Unfortunately is doesn't discriminate between ticks and things I don't want to kill like bees. But I rarely see bees in the tall grasses...they concentrate themselves around the flowering plants. It's pretty cool to watch video of ticks encountering permethrin or even clothing that's been treated. It's like kryptonite to ticks.

[Bailey Guns]

7 dust? If they still sell it.. use to cover the dogs in it growing up and put a perimeter around the house.. I think that's what it was called.

Oh, yeah...Sevin dust. Might consider that in some areas, too.

[sako55]

spray the areas later in the evening after bees are back at the hives. There might still be some pollinator loss but it will be minimized. Better than Rocky Mtn spotted fever in my opinion.

There is an increase in the tick population here this year as well. Some tick collections were done in a few river drainages in the Front Range and it was found that a large percentage of them were carrying the fever.

[BushMasterBoy]

Diatomaceous earth.