It’s getting to be that time of year again when over the next several months, some residents of the Ozarks will have to pluck a tick from their arms, legs or other bodily locations.
I’m one of them. I always get a few ticks on me from April until the first frost in the fall.
Sometimes you can feel when they attach to you, but other times you don’t notice until one has been on you for a while. I hate that; but I don’t know what to do about it. Every year, I do lots of outdoor work (like yard maintenance and improvement), so I enter tick territory and must deal with the consequences.
And how about when ticks get on your dog and you don’t find them until they’re as big as a raisin? That’s always so gross.
For the record, here’s a bit of information about ticks.
Ticks aren’t insects, but are arachnids, like spiders and scorpions. They’re a parasitic form of mite, and (as we know) drink the blood of mammals (including humans) and birds, and sometimes reptiles and amphibians.
Three species are common in Missouri: Lone star tick (females are easily identified by the white dot in the center of their backs, while males often have dots or white streaks on the edge of their bodies), American dog tick (larvae are yellow, while adults display a brown-and-white mottling) and Deer tick (with black upper bodies and legs).
In their adult forms, all three species have eight legs, a small plate over the top of the main body and tough “skin” (which makes them pretty hard to crush). Adults are 1/16 to 1/4-inch long, but can swell to about 3/8-inch long and turn gray when engorged with blood (especially females).
So strange; an eight-legged vampire bug.
During the larval, so-called “seed tick” stage, ticks have six legs and are about as large as a poppy seed.
So strange; they add more legs when they grow up.
Ticks can be found darn near anywhere, including woodlands, tall grass and brushy areas.
So strange; they don’t even have a “favorite” habitat.
Ticks can carry Lyme disease, which is named after the town of Lyme, Connecticut, where it was first identified in 1975. There is speculation (and even some pretty fair evidence) that Lyme disease is the result of a government experiment gone awry, but you won’t find anything “official” about that. Its official cause is a specific bacteria ticks acquire by feeding on infected animals.
Lyme disease is most common in the northeastern and upper midwestern United States, but it’s here in Missouri, too. Just ask my wife, who had a pretty serious bout with it a few years ago and had to turn toward a European method of recovering from it.
Early symptoms of Lyme disease – within 3-30 days of a tick bite – can include a rash around the location of the bite, as well as fever, headache, fatigue and joint pain. Later symptoms can include arthritis, heart issues, neurological problems and skin rashes.
Ticks can also transmit other maladies, including Rocky Mountain spotted fever and Alpha-gal syndrome (which can cause an allergic reaction to eating red meat and is associated with being bitten by lone star ticks).
All that from an itty-bitty pest. I find it weirdly fascinating.
Anyway, no matter how hard I try, I can’t think of anything good about ticks – other than maybe being food for lizards, frogs, or free-range chickens or guineas. It seems to me they’re just nasty and worthless, kind of like mosquitoes, slugs and jellyfish.
I’m not a fan.
But since ticks must be contended with here in the Ozarks, the tick tweezers are in a handy spot and I’m ready for the plucking to begin (again).
You know how some people say they have a list of questions for God when the time comes? I’d like to ask: What’s up with ticks?
Doug Davison is a writer, photographer and newsroom assistant for the Houston Herald. Email: ddavison@houstonherald.com.