In the last two days I have found two deer tick bites on me. The numbers of deer and tick bites on people are increasing. I. Did not think I had been in deer tick areas and a little research told me that magpies can be a carrier. There is currently a family of six magpies visiting my pond and bird bath.
I discovered that they feed on deer ticks ( off of deer who tolerate that well) and often carry ticks. That may be what happened in this case.
At the moment I am hoping that I caught them quickly enough, removed them with tweezers, washed with soap and am using antibiotic cream. Fingers crossed.
A couple of years ago I was not so lucky and ended up on a 17 day course of antibiotics and ran a fever that caused me to hallucinate. This was after a large bullseye rash came.
If you are out and about especially in woodland or long grass do check for ticks afterwards.I had been checking arms and legs but one little nasty had found a warm spot in my bra so be thorough.
If you are immunocompromised you are especially vulnerable if you get a bite and bullseye rash.
There is a spray called Smidge which my golfing friends are encouraged to use. It makes us a wee bit less likely to be bitten.It is available online. Our Golf Club recommends this.
Thank you for taking time to send your post into the forum
I’m sorry to learn about your recent experience with deer tick bites.
This is something i have not read about previously, or come across myself.
I live in the countryside, and we are surrounded by farm land and the wild life that this brings so you post has struck a note with me as we do try to take a stroll when we can and this can be through grass / fields / woodland. I mentioned deer tick bites to my wife who has a nursing background and she immediately knew what i was referring to.
I, like you, am immunocompromised so this is something to consider myself as i navigate the cancer journey
Thank you again for sharing this - I’m confident it will be a post a good number of people find helpful
Oh @GrandmaJo thank you so much for your post and glad that you realised you had deer ticks and managed to remove and clean the areas appropriately.
As you know I walk around the parks where deer live frequently and might not have realised what I had picked up.
I don’t know if you remember but we are also near a river and as soon as the temperatures soar the mosquitos appear and we really get bitten everywhere, so that is my nemesis at the moment. One of my GP’s phlebotomists/receptionists really gets attacked.
Please do let us know how you get on and I am really thinking about you. Look after yourself
Unpleasant things and not uncommon but they aren’t all Deer Ticks as you can find them along cliffs and they are a kind which target sea birds but as they are adaptable they target people too as I found out once when I camped along coastal cliffs!I have been bitten frequently as I am an outdoors person and luckily have never suffered serious consequences.My Uncle did however as he got Typhus which required hospital.You can get special tools to slip over the Tick to pull it off but in my experience they only work with the larger ones.
The point you’ve made about being immunocompromised is important. For anyone on the forum who’s had a tick bite, it’s generally worth contacting your GP or haematology team sooner rather than later rather than waiting to see if symptoms develop, particularly if you notice any redness spreading from the bite site. Catching things early is generally going to be easier than managing something later on.
Fingers crossed for you that these ones stay uneventful, and thank you again for the tip about Smidge as I’d never heard of that, and am someone who spends a lot of time out in nature thanks to my love of entomology!