NEW?GLASGOW - Although the first case of human Lyme disease of the year has been spotted in Bedford, Pictou County residents have little to worry about.
Jeff Ogden, a field entomologist for the Natural Resources Department, says a recent eight-hour search for ticks in Pictou County turned up nothing.
"We were actively searching in prime conditions and not getting a thing," Ogden said. "The risk is quite low."
Ticks are generally found wherever white-tailed deer are. The ticks feed off the deer's blood, which in turn allows them to lay eggs, sometimes as many as 1,500 at a time.
Most areas in the province have ticks, said Ogden, but only those with a high concentration of white-tailed deer end up establishing colonies.
There are currently three areas in the province with active tick colonies - Admiral Cove's Park in Bedford, Lunenburg and Gunning Cove, near Shelburne.
"If you're finding one or two ticks, it's not a big deal," Ogden said. "They fall off migratory birds all the time, and probably 10 per cent of those are positive for Lyme disease."
It's when there are clusters of ticks that you run into trouble.
"The ticks are questing, looking for a meal, and they grab onto anything, whether it's a dog, cat or human," Ogden explained. "When we're doing testing and can't pick up anything at all, there's very little there."
To test for ticks, Ogden literally drags a blanket behind him on the ground. DNR officers recently dragged for eight hours and found very few ticks.
"It wasn't zero, but I don't want people to stay inside and worry about getting Lyme disease," he said.
Lyme disease may cause a rash, fever, fatigue, muscle aches and headaches. If untreated, it can lead to facial palsy as well as chronic joint and heart problems. But don't worry if you see a tick on you - they have to be attached to the body for more than 24 hours before you can contract Lyme disease.
Instead, Ogden said, people should do a "tick check" after they come inside.
"Strip down and look for moles that move," he said. "Get someone to check your back, since that's hard to see."
Ticks are usually only two to five millimetres long, so they can be hard to spot on animals. Ogden suggests quickly brushing your dog when it comes in, but often, the ticks aren't found until they're attached.
"It feels engorged, like a zit," he said.
If you find a tick and are concerned about what it is, bring it to the nearest Natural Resources office, which will send it in for identification and testing.
Tick trek turns up zilch
Lyme disease concerns unwarranted
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Comments
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- tanja
- - January 18th, 2010 at 13:06:55
Oh...I think he is trying to say that there are no deer ticks in NS. I have sent bags of ticks this year to the Department of Natural Resourse, only to be told that they are dog ticks and so far there has been no evidence of Lyme disease being transmitted by NS dogs ticks so they are not tested to this point Well if they are not testing them, how do they know if they carry Lyme Disease or not and what about all the co-infections.
I have tested postive from a lab in Calf. and still can't find a doctor that will treat me in my own province....
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- Louise
- - January 18th, 2010 at 13:00:29
No Tick bourne diseases in NS!!??!! Sounds like Alberta where they have no ?Borrelia burgdorferi or any of the other co-infections that ticks carry.. also have no rats in Alberta either! Since we have no sick ticks, we automatically have MD's that do not do clinical diagnosis for Lyme Disease, therefore we cannot have Legally Lyme sick people. I did not leave Alberta, only played in the mountain meadows and walked the trails of rabbits and deer....Eleven years of inability to work and much suffering until finally I have been given a diagnosis..but had to wait until I had over sixty active symptoms and much damage. No diagoses meant I could not even claim disability all these years and have past the date to claim! Please do your share to promote well-being. Lyme disease can be devasting.
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- Raffi Balmanoukian
- - January 18th, 2010 at 12:48:40
Definitely not - I just found what appears to have been a deer tick in my Golden's skull (first ever and I've had dogs since 2003), and he's only been here and in the city, and in neither instance in deer-populated areas. Thankfully there just seems to have been the one.
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- mike
- - January 18th, 2010 at 12:33:02
I tend to disagree, I have 2 dogs and walk them in deer areas everyday. I check them daily for ticks and find at least one a week. The worst area seems to be between Westville Rd and Munroe Ave, behind the Highland Square Mall. There are some days they pick up a tick a day and then go a week or so with out. Ticks drop off the trees, they don't jump or fly so it depends on the bushes. If I see deer we go the other way, experience tells me if we go anywheres near where the deer have travelled they will pick up a tick. I saved a few for DNR but there are so amny I gave up.
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- Mary
- - January 18th, 2010 at 11:41:51
There are few or no ticks in NS now...everyone can feel safe again!?! This is the most dangerous, inaccurate piece of reporting I've ever seen and it flies in the face of all current studies and research done in NS. Shame on all involved giving the public a false sense of security, even though tick checks are advised. Why would anyone check for ticks when there aren't any? An in-depth story is needed immediately to undo the damage being done by this article as this is high tick season.
