It’s March: Time to Prepare for Tick Control

As the weather gets warmer, tick season begins. More than just a nuisance, the diseases ticks frequently carry can make them a threat to the health of your family and your pets. That’s why it’s important to start tick control as soon as the tick season starts.

What Is Tick Control?

Tick control is a system designed to minimize the risk of tick infestation on your property. Tactics include using effective methods of control at the proper time to produce the best results.

Why Is Tick Control Important?

Ticks are a key health threat to animals and humans due to the diseases they carry and spread. Lyme Disease is the best known of the 15 tick-borne diseases, but others include Rocky Mountain spotted fever, babesiosis, and ehrlichiosis.

Ticks used to be mostly an issue for campers and hikers. Now Long Island has documented cases of tick bites that occurred in backyards. Another study found leaning against a tree in tick-infested areas could lead to a tick attack in as little as 30 seconds.

In addition to the growth of tick communities, the other thing that makes ticks so dangerous is the fact that you could have been bitten without realizing it. Ticks are tiny so they’re not often noticed. Their saliva contains neurotoxins that keep the host from feeling the bite as well as a blood thinner so it’s easier for them to feed.

The Life Cycle of a Tick

• Adult ticks lay eggs in March and April. One adult tick can lay 2,000 eggs.
• Larvae will emerge several weeks later and immediately begin to feed, primarily on mice.
• Larvae turn into nymphs. In this stage they feed on larger mammals like dogs and humans.
• In the fall, nymphs turn into adults in preparation for reproduction.

How to Protect Yourself from Ticks

1. Keep your grass trimmed. Ticks like long grass.
2. Wear clothing treated with picaridin, DEET, IR3535, OLE, PMD or 2-undecanone.
3. Tuck your pants into your socks.
4. Wear light-colored clothing.
5. Inspect yourself, your children and pets when you go indoors.

When Is the Best Time for Tick Treatment?

Female ticks begin laying eggs in spring so that’s when tick treatments should begin. Call our experts at Arrow to determine the best timing based on your location, and how the weather and seasons are changing. Snow should be fully melted, and the ground should be dry, before the first treatment.

For maximum effectiveness, tick treatment should continue into summer and fall to kill ticks at all life stages and before reproduction. Killing ticks before they can lay eggs means a lower tick population the next spring.

Arrow Can Keep You Tick Free

Don’t risk the health of your family and pets. Call us at Arrow Exterminating for complete tick control solutions. To get started,contact Arrow Exterminating today.