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Tick Control

10 Tips to Avoid Tick-Related Illness

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Memorial Day Weekend Tick Awareness10 Tips to avoid ticks

Memorial Day Week is upon us and it’s finally feeling a little bit like sum-… we won’t say it out loud and jinx it. We’re just as happy as you are to feel the sunshine and get ready for a long holiday weekend. With that though, comes backyard BBQ’s and outdoor adventures, so it’s only right that we share this as we head outside and Lyme Disease Awareness Month comes to a close.

We have to remind you that with rising temperatures coincides tick-borne illness. We’re strong believers in that “prevention is better than a cure,” and that a PROACTIVE approach with tick safety is the only way to do it.

Here are 10 tips to embrace to decrease the risk of contracting a tick-related illness.

Remember, ticks can be found anywhere. It’s important to use repellent when going outdoors and to check for ticks often.

• Keep pets confined to your landscaped lawn and never allow them to enter the woods or woods edge.
• If you stopped your pet’s tick prevention over the winter, get it started again NOW.
• Implement a professional rodent control program around your home to reduce the number of ticks on your property.
• Remind kids of the dangers of going into the woods and uncharted territory. Teach them how to check themselves, too.
• Keep a tick removal kit ready so you are well-prepared if you do come across an embedded tick.
• Keep your grass cut short and don’t over-water your plants and shrubs. Ticks are attracted to long grass and cool damp areas.
• Ivy and other sorts of ground cover are tick hot spots and should be avoided.
• As part of your spring yard clean-up, eliminate tick habitats by raking and removing leaves that may have blown into yard edges and under shady vegetation.
• Spray monthly from April through October to control populations on your property.

For those who may not know, the transmission of Lyme disease is most commonly a result of bites by immature ticks called nymphs. The nymphs are less than 2 mm in size, comparable to a poppy seed, are incredibly difficult to see and the bites are painless. In addition to their small size, they typically attach to hard-to-see areas of the body such as the groin, armpits & scalp. As a result, bite victims contract Lyme disease – an acute inflammatory bacterial infection nicknamed “The Great Imitator” because symptoms are similar to many other diseases affecting all organs of the body, including the brain and nervous system, joints and muscles, and heart.

 

How to Deal With Ticks in Autumn

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Tick Control in the Autumn

Autumn in the Northeast can be an incredible time of year. The leaves changing make any wooded area incredible to look at, football is back, pumpkin spice everything, Halloween, and cooler weather. This cooler weather provides for another benefit, the disappearance of many annoying bugs and insects from our lives. Unfortunately, however, ticks are not one of those many bugs. As you will learn, ticks will remain active well into the autumn. In this article is some information on how ticks survive in the autumn, and how to do tick control in the autumn.
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Animals That Help With Tick Control

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Animals That Eat Ticks

When it comes to ticks, it can seem like there is almost no help besides your friends over at East End Tick and Mosquito Control. Deer, mice, squirrels, even dogs, man’s best friend can aid in the spreading of ticks. However, there are a few animals that can live on Long Island that actually eat ticks. With the spread of Lyme Disease, these animals can be extremely beneficial to the residents of Long Island.
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The Strange Relationship Between Acorns and Ticks

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How Acorns Affect Tick Populations

2017 has been a crazy year for tick populations. We have been working around the clock here to make sure we can alleviate the problems of residents on the east end of Long Island caused by ticks on their population. In our work, we have found that this year the tick populations have exploded. But why this year in particular? These extra ticks may have come from an unlikely source, the acorn.

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How To Avoid Being Bitten by Ticks

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Ways to Prevent Tick Bitesavoiding tick bites

It’s pretty well known at this point that many ticks carry dangerous illnesses so it can be alarming finding a tick on your skin, especially so if they are already burrowed in. The best way to prevent having a tick bite you is preventing them from getting on your skin altogether, they do say an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure after all.  We recommend getting your property sprayed for ticks to eliminate these pests on your property of course, but we can’t protect everywhere! If you are hiking, camping, or on vacation, here are some strategies to avoid being bitten by a tick.

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Lyme Disease FAQ

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May is Lyme disease awareness month!

So, what is Lyme disease? We don’t think there has ever been an illness that has been so incredibly misunderstood before in the course of history. Is it hard to catch and easy to get rid of? Easy to catch and hard to get rid of? Or something in-between? Is Lyme disease a bacteria? A virus? A bacteriophage? A parasite? How do you get it, and how do you know if you have it?

The best way to answer these questions and provide the most accurate information available is to cite peer-reviewed scientific articles from medical journals. But no worries! We will translate them into plain English for you!

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Long Island Tick Information: What You Need to Know

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Long Island Tick Behavior

One would think that something as tiny as a tick would not survive freezing cold temperatures under the snow. But actually, they are still alive, lurking, hidden in the leaves, beneath the bushes, conserving energy, waiting for the temperatures to rise. And now, here they come (insert ominous impending shark attack theme here)!  Actually, ticks are predatory creatures like sharks – only just a wee bit smaller. What attracts a tick?

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Meat Allergies from a Tick Bite: Strange But True

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Tick-Borne Diseases

It is common knowledge at this point that there are a wide variety of diseases one can pick up if they are unfortunate enough to be bitten by a tick. One of the more debilitating, and well known diseases is Lyme Disease which can, if left untreated affect people for the entirety of the rest of their lives. This disease is acquired through deer ticks, and symptoms include a target shaped rash where the tick bit the person, fever, chills, and fatigue. Another terrible disease that can be acquired from ticks on Long Island is rocky mountain spotted fever. Rocky mountain spotted fever can be spread through the American dog tick, Rocky Mountain wood tick, and brown dog tick according to the Center for Disease Control. Symptoms of this disease include fever, a spotted rash, headache, nausea, vomiting, and abdominal pain. So we have found out two of the more common diseases associated with tick bites; Lyme Disease and rocky mountain spotted fever. More recently however, a new phenomenon has been occurring in people bitten by the Lone Star Tick.
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Ticks in Winter: Cause for Concern?

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Are ticks active in winter?

It’s winter here on Long Island and while the amount of bugs we see regularly dwindles in the winter time we know they will be back once spring time rolls around again. While it is usually bitterly cold outside there can be warm periods in the winter where the temperature can get above even 60 degrees Fahrenheit. This is a great time to go outside and enjoy a brief intermission from the cold and get a little taste of spring with the added bonus of there being no ticks, mosquitoes or other disease carrying bugs to worry about. Except that may not be entirely true.

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