Club 80-90 Forums

I was away camping in the Trossachs at the weekend in the van with my wee daughter, bit rainy, but had a good time.

AND THEN!!!!

Earlier this evening I scratched an itchy bit on my back and discovered a TICK!!! Attached to my back!!!! Bleurgh!!!!

Luckily my wife, who is a nurse, managed to prise it out (despite my beastie induced panic), but now I'm worried (on the basis of some fairly horrific Google sourced stories and pictures)......

Should I be?????????

Yeah, you're gonna die! It'll be painful and slow.

Actually, I've been bitten by ticks several times, as have many of my friends when wild camping on Dartmoor. None of us have ever got ill from it. There are tools and methods to correctly remove the tick, including its head, jaws and stomach, which do reduce the risk of infection. But we don't use these all the time, as they're often left at home.

I remember a time a well-endowed girl friend got home and went to shower, only to scream to her hubby. He shot up, to find she had a tick under each booby. No harm done, apart from a shock.

There is a risk of catching Lyme disease. Read the blurb at http://www.netdoctor.co.uk/diseases/fac ... isease.htm and keep an eye on the bite site.
A decent tick removal tool which I have used can be got from http://www.lymediseaseaction.org.uk/inf ... emoval.htm.

best of luck,
Patrick.

3 years ago we went walking up in the depths of Scotland came home and noticed what I thought was a small scab so picked it and it came off with legs wiggling in the air. That was it we both stripped and a thorough examination was undertaken, my girlfriend found one on her arm, no time for careful removal she just ripped it off in sheer terror leaving the head in, later to be dug out - no lymes disease yet - evil little buggers

As the victim of one or two ticks and the remover of literally hundreds from our dogs when we lived in East Anglia (red Deer are mainly responsible for the prevelance of the tick population) there is an easy removal method;

take a pair of tweezers (flat ends like pliers, not pointed ends) and grip the offending insect with the tweezers as close to your skin (or your dog's) as possible. This is the awkward part: then rotate the tick ANTI-CLOCKWISE at least 360 degrees and you will feel a click, the tick will come away complete with jaws, head etc. If you pull them away without the twist, or you rotate them clockwise, you will leave jaws or other bits still attached and they will fester. The reason for the anti-clockwise twist is to do with the way their jaws interlock (try twisting the old-fashioned type of key ring the wrong way and you'll see what I mean). If you reverse your wrist the opposite way to start with you'll get 360 degrees of twist.

Ticks are the carriers of many diseases, mainly Lyme Disease in the UK, which ain't so funny if you get it, although it's still incredibly rare. Don't worry about the odd tick bite, it's the mess they make when they fall off you full of blood and you tread them into the new carpet!!


I must get out more

Get yourself checked for Lyme's disease, a friend of my old mans found out she had Lyme's disease years after being bitten by a tick.

If you still have the tick take it to you doctors they send it away to be tested.

Chances are it will turn out fine but I would get a check up.

My mum's just been diagnosed with Lymes disease after getting a tick bite IN THE GARDEN! how unlucky is that. Thankfully they caught it early - but it still sounds pretty rough.

if your bothered by ticks then dont goto Slovenia! there are millions of em there and they hang in trees awaiting 'victims' whereby they drop onto you - given that Slovenia is more than 80% forrest you have a more than strong chance of being haf!

Wolfsburg Willy wrote:As the victim of one or two ticks and the remover of literally hundreds from our dogs when we lived in East Anglia (red Deer are mainly responsible for the prevelance of the tick population) there is an easy removal method;

take a pair of tweezers (flat ends like pliers, not pointed ends) and grip the offending insect with the tweezers as close to your skin (or your dog's) as possible. This is the awkward part: then rotate the tick ANTI-CLOCKWISE at least 360 degrees and you will feel a click, the tick will come away complete with jaws, head etc. If you pull them away without the twist, or you rotate them clockwise, you will leave jaws or other bits still attached and they will fester. The reason for the anti-clockwise twist is to do with the way their jaws interlock (try twisting the old-fashioned type of key ring the wrong way and you'll see what I mean). If you reverse your wrist the opposite way to start with you'll get 360 degrees of twist.

Ticks are the carriers of many diseases, mainly Lyme Disease in the UK, which ain't so funny if you get it, although it's still incredibly rare. Don't worry about the odd tick bite, it's the mess they make when they fall off you full of blood and you tread them into the new carpet!!


I must get out more

Velly iterlesting Glasshopper. Dare I suggest that in say Australia the twist should be clockwise due to the precessional effect at conception? Or would that be taken with the same pinch of salt as the water in plug hole theory?
Cheers
Wolfie

Wolfie,
you don't mean precessional effect, that's gyroscopic. You mean Coriolis Effect, that's what makes your water go down the plug'ole widdershins!

I am trying to get out more. I wanted to go to Vanfest but I've got to go with a grown up.


Willy

RE grab with tweezers. DON'T. This squeezes the body which causes infected contents of tick stomach to pump back into your system which is what causes the lymes disease. Get a tick remover.

Wolfsburg Willy wrote:Wolfie,
you don't mean precessional effect, that's gyroscopic. You mean Coriolis Effect, that's what makes your water go down the plug'ole widdershins!

I am trying to get out more. I wanted to go to Vanfest but I've got to go with a grown up.


Willy

Yes you are probably right. Did you just take what you were told or read as true or have you been able to satisfy yourself by reasoning. Yes it is a bit difficult to get your brain around and true It is generally ascribed to the coriolis effect but if you discuss it with like and open minded people of a particular persuasion it is posible to cause even more confusion by stuff like that asking the question: Does the magnitude of the force increase or decrease as you move away from the equator. The inference is that it increases. Unfortunatelly this argument seems to hold for both cases and so gives no clue. Many highly respected people whose opinions are beyond question have got it hopelessly wrong in history and few have owned up to it. Was it that clever chap in the wheelchair and computerised voice that recently admitted that a proposition he put foreward over twenty five years ago is colpletlley wrong?
I just said the first thing that came into my head....
Cheers
Wolfie

The tool to get is one of the little green jobs that looks like a two-pronged fork, bent into a swans neck (does that make sense?) Get them from your local vet. Can't remember the brand name, something original like "ticktwister". Doesn't matter which way you twist to remove, as the tick's proboscis is serrated on 4 sides, like a stack of arrow heads. Twisting makes the barbs lay over, allowing removal...
Get a blood test if you get caught, vital if abroad. It is spreading from Central Europe by the year.

Still hanging in there, no sign of any horrific diseaseyness.........

Have still got the blighter in the freezer though!