The Hidden Lives of Ticks.
Buried deep within your dog’s fur or in your hairline, these parasites are both gross and kinda interesting (bear with me)…….
Hello Friends.
I hadn’t planned on kicking-off TL newsletters by discussing these blood-sucking parasites, but since they are in abundance at the moment I figured, why not. And if I’m being perfectly honest, ticks gross me out. They make my skin twitch and can easily set off a paranoia as soon as I see one while walking in the woods or in the tree-line on our ranch. If I feel a tickle on my neck or shoulders I question whether it’s my hair or the tiny legs of a tick crawling on me.
It’s one sensation to see them crawling on my dogs and another, dirtier feeling when I see one crawling along my clothing or inside the house along the walls or furniture — let alone when I need to pluck an embedded one from my dog’s body (or mine). Yet, as awful as I find that, I’m also intrigued as to how ticks can embed themselves into skin so securely and without the feeling of a bite or making me go “ouch”. It’s usually the delicate movement of their legs against my skin that let’s me know I have one attached to me. And oddly enough, once I pluck one from my skin, the spot where they once were is really sore. So here it is — almost everything you didn’t know that you wanted to know about ticks.
xo ~ Suzanne
Ticks are parasitic arachnids that are part of the mite superorder known as Parasitiformes. They live by feeding on the blood of mammals, birds, and sometimes reptiles and amphibians. Adults ticks have eight legs and pear-shaped bodies which become engorged with blood when they feed and are approximately 3 to 5 mm in length depending on age, sex, species, and "fullness".
Ticks belong to two major families, the Ixodidae or hard ticks, which have a hard shield on their dorsal surfaces and a beak-like structure at the front containing the mouthparts; and the Argasidae, or soft ticks which have their mouthparts on the underside of their bodies. They locate potential hosts by sensing odor, body heat, moisture, and/or vibrations in the environment. Because of their blood-ingesting diets, ticks act as vectors of many serious diseases that affect humans and other animals.
They have four life cycle stages: egg, larva, nymph, and adult…which are actually pretty interesting, but for the sake of not making your skin twitch any more than it probably is I’ll stop here and include links in the footnotes so you can learn more if you so choose.
The date of origin of ticks is uncertain, but they have been around a very, very long time with the oldest known tick fossils dating back to the Cretaceous period — around 100 million years old.
Behavior and Feeding.
Ticks are blood-feeding parasites that attach themselves to their host by using their cutting mandibles (chelicerae) to cut into the surface of the host’s skin and then insert its feeding tube (hypostome) — which prevents the blood from clotting by excreting an anticoagulant. This feeding tube is covered with recurved teeth that serves as an anchor keeping it firmly in place on the host’s skin.
Some ticks attach to their host rapidly, while others wander around searching for thinner skin, such as that in the ears of mammals. Depending on the species and life stage, preparing to feed can take from ten minutes to two hours. Once completely engorged the tick will drop off its host.
Ticks find their hosts by detecting an animals' breath and body odors, sensing body heat, moisture, or vibrations.
Range.
Tick species are widely distributed around the world. In general, they are found wherever their host species occur. Their range is vast due to a few interesting factors. Migrating birds carry ticks with them during their seasonal migrations thereby redistributing ticks in various stages of its lifecycle to different parts of the world. Many tick species have extended their ranges as a result of the movements of people, domesticated pets, and livestock. Increasing participation in outdoor activities such a hiking, increases the exposure of people and their dogs to ticks.
Habitat.
For an ecosystem to support ticks, it must satisfy two requirements; the population density of host species in the area must be great enough and it must be humid enough for ticks to remain hydrated.
Ticks tend to flourish more in warm, humid climates, because they require a certain amount of moisture in the air to undergo metamorphosis, and low temperatures inhibit their development of eggs to larvae. In our neck of the woods of northern California, not only is the rainy season a time of year ticks thrive in, but so are the year-round, moisture rich environments of the foggy, coastal areas in Marin, Mendocino, and Monterey counties.
One of the preferred habitats for ticks is the interface where a lawn meets the forest, or more generally, the ecotone, which is the unmaintained transitional edge habitat between woodlands and open areas.
Ticks like shady, moist leaf litter with an overstory of trees or shrubs and, in the spring, they deposit their eggs into such places allowing larvae to emerge in the fall and crawl into low-lying vegetation. The 3 meter boundary closest to the lawn's edge are a tick migration zone, where 82% of tick nymphs in lawns are found.
A good tick management strategy is to remove leaf litter, brush, and weeds at the edge of the woods.
Tick-borne Diseases.
Ticks can transmit an array of infectious diseases that affect humans and other animals including zoonotic pathogens such as bacteria, viruses, and protozoa. The infective agents can be present not only in the adult tick, but also in the eggs produced by the females.
A tick can also carry more than one type of pathogen thereby making diagnosis difficult. That said, it’s good to know that not all individual ticks are infected with pathogens.
Here is the US, Lyme disease is the most commonly reported vector-borne disease. When I lived on the east coast all of my dogs had been exposed and treated for Lyme disease. I’ve also known people and dogs to have tested positive to, and subsequently treated, ehrlichiosis and Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever.
Here’s a list of tick-borne diseases that you should be aware of (not to make you edgy, but because knowledge is power especially when it comes to treating our dogs and ourselves): Ehrlichiosis, Lyme Disease, Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever, Colorado Tick Fever, Q Fever, Tularemia, Relapsing Fever, Babesiosis, Meningoencephallitis and Canine Jaundice among others. If you’re curious about a more comprehensive list, you’ll find handy links in the footnotes.
Preventative Medications for Dogs.
Thankfully for our dogs there are several FDA-approved brands of tick preventatives available on the market — from your veterinarian and online sources. And I will say, the products have come a long since the days of topical-only applications. Like leaps and bounds. My dogs take a single monthly dose of NexGard (it’s an edible chew) and it works brilliantly at killing ticks shortly after they bite. It’s been a game changer for us. Like all pharmaceutical drugs there are risks and rewards. Be sure to speak with your veterinarian about which product is right for your dog.
Notes:
https://www.sfgate.com/local/article/northern-california-tick-hot-spots-17770270.php
https://www.bayarealyme.org/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tick
https://nexgardforpets.com/
