Have you heard of tick tubes?

After reading one of my recent columns on deer ticks and Lyme disease, Carla Heisten of Chelsea alerted me to tick tubes. Her message is informative and important, so I will share it with you today. Here is Carla’s message, with the information you need to start using tick tubes.

George, I HATE ticks. Got a couple bites after I got my deer. I got them off quickly, but still they burn and itch. YUK! You know what works a little on the bites…draw out salve! Yep, it sooths them a bit, but it is messy and requires a bandaid to keep the salve off your clothes.

Anyhow…that isn’t really why I am writing…what I wanted to ask is, have you heard of tick tubes? You can make them with the paper tubes from toilet paper or paper towels, dryer lint or other fluffy stuff, and permethrin spray. If you Google the topic there are several sites showing ways to make them…all quite similar.

(You can access one of those sites here) (And another site here).

I love that they are mostly recycled products anyone can easily save except for the permethrin which you can get on Amazon or I suspect in local stores.

George, I tried using these this summer after my dogs and I got ticks on us in the spring…and never saw a tick all summer until I got my deer in the woods this fall… which was a little further than I spread the tubes! I have been trying to tell people about this and if a lot of people would do it I think it would impact the tick population at least around people’s homes. It is cheap, easy and in my experience it has worked pretty well.

I wonder if you could put this in a column to get the word out? I think if people have something they can DO it would be good…I felt totally helpless about them until I started doing this.

Thanks, Carla, Chelsea, Maine

And thank you Carla for this information!  – george

 

George Smith

About George Smith

George stepped down at the end of 2010 after 18 years as the executive director of the Sportsman’s Alliance of Maine to write full time. He writes a weekly editorial page column in the Kennebec Journal and Waterville Morning Sentinel, a weekly travel column in those same newspapers (with his wife Linda), monthly columns in The Maine Sportsman magazine, two outdoor news blogs (one on his website, georgesmithmaine.com, and one on the website of the Bangor Daily News), and special columns for many publications and newsletters. Islandport Press published a book of George's favorite columns, "A Life Lived Outdoors" in 2014. In 2014, George also won a Maine Press Association award for writing the state's bet sports blog. In 2016, Down East Books published George's book, Maine Sporting Camps, and Islandport Press published George and his wife Linda's travel book, Take It From ME, about their favorite Maine inns and restaurants.