Ticks, is it game over for shorts?

Guys look after yourself and get rubbered up if you’re out on the hills, no embarrassing questions at Boots as you stand there in your skimpy shorts and running shoes they will know why you need them

I’m also not aware of having been bitten – is it possible to be bitten and not not notice.

Mosquitoes and midges though – bastards have me for breakfast, lunch and dinner

Both p20 and I got loads wild camping in Scotland last year. Just really unlucky with the spot we picked (we picked very very carefully the following night and basically never sat down until we got in the tent and zipped it up). Couple of months later neither of us were feeling great for several weeks and the GP gave both of us a run of antibiotics as a precaution, given I must have had 20+ bites in 24 hours, and did feel a lot better after. No doubt in my experience the number of ticks has got worst (even aside from that crazy bad one off). Now very careful where I sit/stand and use smidge.

Point of order: the bullseye only occurs in about 2/3rds of Lymes cases (IIRC) so don’t treat the lack of it as a negative diagnosis.

My understanding is that, if you do actually get the bullseye, it may not be on the bite site either

Bullseye rash not always present in Lyme cases.

Yes, absolutely possible to be bitten and not notice, most likely on your back or behind a knee etc. Some are tiny. I’m paranoid about ticks – I live in the South Downs NP with deer and sheep everywhere and Lyme disease present. If go off the path into long grass or leafy mulch in the woods I’m guaranteed to pick up two or three. So they’ve caused me to alter my behaviour – no sitting or camping on grass, no walking through it, no sandals (still wear shorts), and always checking carefully for ticks on arms and legs afterwards. There was a wedding this weekend in the village with lots of kids running through a meadow and I wondered if anybody had warned them about ticks…

I ride, camp, walk and generally hang out in tick areas. My ride buddies regularly get ticks, my dog gets them early on season before I give her bravecto, I’ve never had one.. Not even a nibble. I wear shorts, t shirts and only use Smidge for midges. Ticks just don’t like me.

. Ticks just don’t like me.

I think ticks have a preferred target, whether body temp, hairiness, smell or something. Wife hasn’t had one in the 20 years we’ve been doing outdoor stuff together, I’ve had tonnes.

Deer ticks can live on pheasants and blackbirds too.  I think the masssive increase is due to huge numbers of pheasant chicks being imported from France with Lyme disease infused ticks already on them..  I think the reason frontline isn’t used for humans is it has really bad long term health issues in prolonged use – dogs dont live very long so it matters less to them…

I found one feeding off my gooch a few years ago

I’m the same. I have had loads, my wife has never had one.  Must be subtle chemicals that attract them.

Lived in Snowdonia for the past 3 years, been holidaying here for nearly 50.  Only ever had 3 tick bites.  Never see ’em.

I kinda thought they were prevalent elsewhere in the country but the map shows a medium risk.

Anyway – there’s a tick surveillance scheme – you can send your tick off with a form and they record the data and make it publically available to help map tick risk.  Bit of voluntary citizen-science there :)

I’ve always wondered why stuff like Frontline apparently works for cats but we can’t have it. A little spot in the back of your neck every month or two doesn’t seem too bad for people who spend a lot of time outdoors!

oddly I’ve idly wondered about this.

Never had a tick although pulled them off the dog, have been stung by loads of things ,hate horseflies and being stung on the head behind the ear by a wasp or bee, that was nearly a fall of the bike moment.

Only had two ever, despite being in and around ferns lots – riding, hiking, gardening, working. But our outdoor cat has recently needed 5+ taken off him every day. Gonna change his flea meds again I think. A mate of mine, who’s a forester keeps telling me that if you stroke a tick the right way, gently, and repeatedly it will relax and fall out. Don’t know how true that is!

But horse flies – i hate those guys, but they seem to love me! Had to cut yesterdays hike on Exmoor short as both myself and the missus got mauled by the buggers – i swotted at least 20 on me during 9km. I’ve never seen them as bad as they were yesterday…

A mate of mine, who’s a forester keeps telling me that if you stroke a tick the right way, gently, and repeatedly it will relax and fall out.

not recommended with knob ticks, just increases their food supply…

Must be subtle chemicals that attract them.

Yep, the smell of the nutrients you give off when you sweat is a big factor in what you’ll attract

I’m also not aware of having been bitten – is it possible to be bitten and not not notice.

yes a tick bite is not usually painful or itchy, if something happens that causes them to drop off before you notice you would just have a tiny red mark.   I would think it’s less likely you would get Lyme if you get bitten and the tick leaves before you notice as the experts seem to say it needs to be attached for a while (>24h) to infect you.  They get bigger as they feed so longer it’s attached more likely you will see it.

It’s really interesting how people’s reports of tick ‘bites’ varies from “never been bitten” to “I pick up ticks all the time”.

I think it’s geographical. Growing up in Herefordshire/Shropshire and doing all my outdoor pursuits there and in Wales I’d not really heard of them never mind seen one. These days I mostly ride in isolated woodlands around Cardiff that I don’t think have any deer at all, and whilst there are sheep they aren’t in the woods. I also think that if you only have sheep the farmers dipping them keeps numbers down. The first I ever saw one was on my then 2-yo in Germany, picked up at a local suburban play area with long grass – it must’ve come from a dog as there weren’t any deer or sheep areas around. Then both kids picked them up on a caravan site near Dolgellau that was shared with sheep – perhaps the farmer hadn’t dipped? Then on our first trip to Scotland we sat down by a river for a lovely picnic and the ticks were absolutely all over us in minutes.

I live in the middle of one of swedens hotspots, in the middle of a forest, deer and moose in the garden type thing.

I still wear shorts, just check after every ride, TBH, i check most days if i’ve been outside. Keep an eye on any bite sites and ring the doctors if it goes hot, or hard, or red or the bullseye rash, obviously discount the hard if it’s on my knob (not yet, thank god). Then you get some antibiotics. Don’t generally even need to go to the surgery, just a phone call or two. I’ve had one round, one kid has had two, the other one, the ex gets bitten the most, but she goes running in the forest a lot, the rest of us walk (long trousers) or cycle (larger trails and/or moving faster). I’m also vaccinated against TBE.

I think it’s geographical. Growing up in Herefordshire/Shropshire and doing all my outdoor pursuits there and in Wales I’d not really heard of them never mind seen one.

There are undoubtedly geographic differences, but there are seasonal differences, weather differences, vegetation differences (long grass and bracken v gorse and trees) and annual variation plus likely longer-term climate type trends.  They were certainly known about by “outdoor types” in the 90’s (the preferred method of removal seemed to involve a lit cigarette!) but the health risks are definitely more widely promoted now – the internet will have “helped” with that but it may also have lead to some “fear”.

I still wear shorts, just check after every ride,

They will crawl over clothing to get to exposed skin anyway, and then carry on until they find somewhere warm and moist, meaning that you risk it even if you’re fully clothed and put a hand down, or brush your face against undergrowth, or stop for long enough for them to crawl onto your shoes. The only two occasions I have found them on me were after walks on Dartmoor where I wasn’t wearing shorts. Some people above have described them as tiny – mine were fairly obvious and I wasn’t checking myself for ticks, just showering.

due to huge numbers of pheasant chicks being imported from France with Lyme disease infused ticks already on them.

I was wondering how they were making it over the Channel.

They were certainly known about by “outdoor types” in the 90’s (the preferred method of removal seemed to involve a lit cigarette!)

‘Outdoor types’. :D

I was a student living on Dartmoor, late 80s, when I got the first of the ones I described above. I was definitely not an ‘outdoors type’ but yes, they were known about.

100% DEET ftw. I’ve seen a couple crawling on the ground lately but they make a wide berth.

Going back a few years now, my family moved to the Isle of Man when I was 16 and I lived over there for a couple of years before moving back to the UK for uni. The dog used to get hundreds of the buggers taking him for a walk on Laxey headland. Barely ever saw them back in North Yorkshire where I’m from. Now riding mates from home tell me they regularly get bitten by them riding over the moors.

We recently came back from a holiday in Scotland where our dog picked up loads. The trossachs seemed to be the worst. He would have them after a 5 minute walk around a campsite and generally had upwards of 20 per day for the first few days. They all die quickly as he has Bravecto but we didn’t fancy 100s of dead ticks in our small campervan so we went to a Pet Shop in Crieff. They suggested Tickless, which is a small ultra sonic device. For the remaining 1 1/2 weeks of our holiday he had one or two. Not sure if this is solely due to Tickless or that there are many more ticks in the trossachs compared to Perthshire and the Cairngorms.

They also make a Tickless for people so this might be worth a try if you live or regularly ride somewhere with loads of them.

Any recommendations for the most effective spray? I have some ‘Trek’ but it says ‘no DEET’. Will it work?

Sounds OK. Contains Saltidin, the same active ingredient as Smidge.

Cheers SR, I’ve just ordered a load of Smidge too. Was challenged on here about being concerned having seen a number of deer in Lady Cannings but the Sheffield Star reports,

“We are seeing a stratospheric rise in tick numbers in the Peak District at the moment.
“There has been a perfect storm of contributing factors this year including a hot dry summer and a change in land management in the area – lack of conservation grazing, and limited vegetation burning and bracken spraying have all made matters far worse.”

I’ve been bitten literally hundreds of times over the years (always north of the border) so tend to be a bit more relaxed about this than the current prevailing attitude that a tick bite is tantamount to having Novichok injected directly into your brain stem. There’s a debate to be had about “othering’ the natural environment and making it something to be feared rather than simply respected. I also suspect the internet has facilitated a thriving industry in Lyme-related quackery.

But I’m not a denialist and there’s no harm in taking reasonable precautions so, prior to a recent 10 day trip to Jura and the adjacent mainland, ‘wild camping’ every night apart from one evening on a campsite, I treated my boots, trousers and inner tent with permethrin spray. I also checked for ticks when I remembered, and didn’t leave the inner tent door open longer than necessary. I picked up one tick during the trip, on my ankle, on the evening I was on the campsite (the day I returned to the mainland, but wouldn’t rule out having brought it over from Jura on my clothing, as the island’s notorious for them).

They’ve definitely increased in the Highlands over the last couple of decades so, while I’m happy to walk into a bivi in shorts in e.g. the Dales, as I did on Monday evening, I’m not sure I’d now opt for either shorts or a bivi in Scotland.

I get itchy at abite site so always notice.   Smidge and a tick twister for the win.

Yorkshire here. Lyme/Ticks was something I never really thought about until a couple of years ago, when I got this – it was possibly Dalby Forest. It hurt like a bastard and I got all nervous and anxious having done all this reading into people who have had horrific debilitating long term Lyme Disease.

However – rang GP, asked for a photo, bosh, yep, they congratulated me on my knowledge (“Doc I think this is erythema migrans”) and for not ignoring it and put me straight on the rather strong antibiotics that day. 2 years ago, absolutely nothing since.

I guess my point is that yes, Ticks and Lyme disease are very serious but also for the benefit of anyone who might be reading this in the future, it doesnt automatically mean your GP is going to ignore you and your life will be changed.

Rarely get bitten, probably one or two a year but even then I have had a confirmed infection of Lyme. Took a while to get my doctor to take me seriously, they really thought it was a fake disease, but when the lethargy got to me quite seriously they ran tests and I came back positive. A long course of antibiotics eventually sorted it out and I’ve got no lasting effects but it did knock me down a few pegs for nearly 12 months!

Still ride in shorts just make sure I check for them afterwards.

Thanks everyone for your replies. It seems not only area, but also (somehow) person based.
I’ll be using Smidge and probably light coloured long pants too. Thanks Nukeproof.
Might treat trousers with permethrin tick killer – any experience with that??
Do they really get into the scalp!!??
Buggers aren’t they.

Dont try burn em off guys. Apparently it makes the puke, thus injecting their infected digestive tract contents.
Some say twist to remove (see “tick twister for sale at Ray Mears) some say never twist. Smidge card seems a good idea.
Forewarned is forearmed. I hope I never see one.

My understanding is that, if you do actually get the bullseye, it may not be on the bite site either

I was told this when I got one.

Yesterday, South Glos.

2 ticks on the shin :(. Through leggings on another rider.

I myself wear bib tights and am now thinking of wearing an extra pair tights underneath, a high denier type.

Remember that episode of Father Ted in the lingerie dept ;-)

Redthunder. So they get through the leggings?
That’s surprising. And not at the edge either if on their shins.
But apparenty not through 80 denier tights. Well from the video that’s mozzies at least.
Hope your pal got those 2 little buggers off and is uninfected.

I picked 6 off my legs during a cafe stop yesterday afternoon. Just the wee ones, still crawling.

@redthunder

Yesterday, South Glos

Not nice! Whereabouts was that? Seriously need to get covered up, I reckon.

@hightensionline

North Bristol.