Syracuse.com - Reader: It's tick time again, so take precautions

[HuntingNY-News]

By the time I got home I picked 3 ticks off my clothing and another 5 ticks off my body that had somehow got under my shirt and onto my torso.

A female deer tick. AP  

Peter Palumb, of Syracuse, wrote me this week, noting the following about ticks. It caught my eye because my wife pulled one off my dog Cali just last week:

"I just wanted to give you an update on our previous conversation last year regarding the tick problem in Eastern Onondaga County and Western Madison County. Last evening, April 9th, I took a walk in the woods bordered by Palmer Road, Route 173, and Salt Springs Road between 5:30 and 7:30 pm

By the time I got home I picked 3 ticks off my clothing and another 5 ticks off my body that had somehow got under my shirt and onto my torso. Like last year's early season hike on land next to Green Lakes State Park where I encountered 14 ticks after a 3 hour walk looking for sheds and scouting, I never sat and kept on my feet for the duration.

While hunting this same area for coyotes the last week of March, I had one on me while sitting in a chair enclosed by a make shift ground blind on the edge of a cornfield. Weird thing was there was still snow on most of the ground and the temperature hovered in the mid 30s. I though this to be very strange considering the only ticks I had seen before when it was this cold had been on deer I had just harvested.

I put the ticks in an old prescription bottle and labeled it where and when found and I will keep them as I find them if you come across anyone including the health department that might want them to test which ones if any are carrying Lyme Disease or one of the other 12 some diseases ticks are known to carry.

I continue to believe this is a serious health risk to people like us who love and spend considerable time in the outdoors. I assume the large populations of ticks I've noticed over the last two years during the early spring were due to the relatively mild winters we have had and the increase in deer populations due to vast amounts of non hunt able acreage.

Another observation, Eastern Onondaga County seems to be very high in tick population compared to Western Onondaga County. An old hunting buddy of mine lives up on Onondaga Hill and we can walk his land all day and never pick up one.

Editor's note: Despite Palumb's comments, county Health Department officials say residents living throughout the county area at risk of contact with ticks. Check out this story I wrote last year on the topic.

Please remind your readers to be careful and check themselves and especially their children after time spent in the outdoors. Lyme Disease is a very serious health problem and if we can help just one person avoid it we have done a service to our fellow citizens.

Read more about the topic of tick prevention on you and your pets.

View the full article on The Syracuse Outdoors Blog