Tips to Prevent and Handle Ticks
We love hiking and exploring the great outdoors, but we hate dealing with ticks. Thankfully we know what to do to help prevent ticks and how to handle them if do end up landing on us.
Ticks are common around most hiking trails in the world. They live in regions with warm humid climates. Here are some tips to help you prevent ticks.
Tick Prevention Tips
1. Wear the right clothes
Light colored clothing should be work to more easily see ticks or wear long sleeves and pants tucked into socks to prevent them from accessing skin, shoes not sandals
2. Use Tick repellents
Tick repellent with DEET should be used on skin and tick repellent with permethrin on clothing (not skin). (Be sure to follow official directions on sprays)
3. Watch where you step.
Avoid the grass and brush, stick to the trails.
4. Check yourself and your family.
Take a close look over yourself and family after taking a hike or being outdoors. Be sure to check our armpits, groin area and waistbands..
If you do find a tick don’t freak out, it happens. Follow the steps below to remove it.
Tick Handling and Removal Tips
1. Use tweezers or fingers wrapped in tissue, grab tick close to surface of skin try not to jerk or twist as you pull.
2. Do not squeeze the body because it could release disease causing organisms into bite wound.
3. Do not use matches gasoline or nail polish.
4. Wash clothes and check yourself and family again.
Check out these Tick Repellents and related items.
Watch out for Symptoms
Thankfully tick bites are mostly harmless and may not produce symptoms. However if you are allergic you could have some of the listed symptoms below.
Possible Allergic Symptoms from Tick Bites
1. Swelling or pain at bite
2. Rash
3. Burning sensation
4. Blister
5. Severe cases could cause difficulty of breathing
Disease carrying symptoms
As mentioned earlier most tick bites are harmless but you could notice some disease carrying symptoms. These from withing several days to a few weeks after initial bite.
1. Full body rash or smaller spot or rash
2. Neck stiffness
3. Nausea
4. Weakness and/or muscle or joint pain
5. Fever and/or chills
6. Swollen lymph nodes
Be sure to visit your doctor and get medical attention ASAP if bitten and experience possible symptoms. It’s better to be safe than sorry.
For additional information on ticks prevention and symptoms check out the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Official Site.
For more Outdoor Adventure Related Items check out some gear that we use and recommend on our Amazon Shop.
Don’t let your fear of ticks or any fears in general prevent you from experiencing what our wonderful planet has to offer.
We feel that dealing with these tiny pests are worth the experiences and now that you know these tips we hope you have a wonderful hiking adventure with your family.
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What do you think? How have you dealt with ticks on your hikes? Does the fear of ticks prevent you from hiking? Please comment and let us know.
Full Disclosure: This post does contain Amazon affiliate links. If you click through and purchase I could receive a small commission at no extra charge to you. Thank you for your support – Dylan
Great tips! Instead of using tweezers to remove a tick (which is likely to remove the body only and then you’ll probably have to go to the doctor to get the head removed), I recommend getting an inexpensive “tick key”. I keep one of these on my keychain all the time!
I have an inordinate fear of ticks and bugs in general…these tips will help me be more prepared, and thus less fearful. We went to Africa and were in an area with lots of bugs – we used the Rebel MAX spray and had zero problems. Love them!
Nice tips, good point about wearing light clothing to make them easier to find. We’re familiar with ticks because we have dogs, but thankfully haven’t gotten them on us.
Great to see something proactive about avoiding Ticks. I’m terrified of Lyme disease so this is helpful. Didn’t know that burning them out (match stick method) isn’t a good idea.
These tips are so handy to know, will definitely be keeping these in mind when on my outdoor adventures!
Being based in Australia I’ve never had issue with ticks before. When I was in Czech it was a real issue when we were hiking and I was petrified of taking home ticks. These are great basic tips to help people remove and prevent tick infestation
Wow very useful post to know about ticks. I faced problems with leeches once during one of my hikes along a stream. Salt was the only thing that helped then.
This is a wonderful and very useful post. You have written great points on how to prevent these. And you are right one must seek immediate medical attention if the symptoms are severe.
Timely post, as I just pulled one of these buggers off me last night. I’m surprised I found it. It was on a part of my back I could barely reach. If it hadn’t been for it itching, I probably still wouldn’t know about it.
So many great tips! Especially as we head into spring and summer and start hiking again. I need to stock up on some tick repellent for sure!
This is such an informative post. Ticks have become so rampid recently. Definitely need to get some tick repellent. Nice tips
Good tips and good to be prepared! My son once got a tick embedded in his scalp. I was shocked at how strong that tick was and how difficult it was to remove it. Fortunately for us, it did not appear to be carrying any disease. But even after we got it out and put it in a ziploc bag, we couldn’t even kill it with a hammer!
We have loads of these during monsoons. It was quite crazy fending them off. I wore full clothes and boots but despite the same they found their way in …argh. Thankfully did not get bitten too badly and had to use salt to get them off. Glad to know there are medicines. Must look those up