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Hey everyone. My family is considering moving to the Bethel region in a year or 2, if at least one of us can land a teaching job in the area. We will be visiting soon and it looks like an absolute dream, but ticks concern me..
It looks like lymes is pretty rampant in southern Maine.. is it bad in Bethel? We have dogs with long fur and a daughter who loves to play outside all day. What months of the year are ticks active and how many can we expect to see? I’m a worrier so I’m still not sure I could deal with the many tick checks and constantly wondering if I missed any, especially on my daughter. Is the tick situation expected to get worse?
And, another insect question.. I’ve heard black flies are bad too. In reality how are those, and mosquitos, horseflies etc..? I currently live in Alaska and I’m hoping to escape the voracious biters at least a bit.
Ticks, where present, are out from April through October. I workin the woods and I have never seen a tick from Lincoln north and east. Back flies are a big nuisance from the middle of May into June. These are followed by "skeeters". They need high humidity to fly.When the sky is dark blue the skeeters will be down in the leaves and grass. Deer flies are not bad until August. I have been going down the road at 40 miles an hour and had deer flies flying formation on me. Take a piece of tan 2 sided carpet tape and put it on your hat. When you take your hat off there will be deer flies on it.
NMLM's experience is different from mine. We start finding ticks as soon as the snow melts, and I find them on me through the November hunting season. I treat clothes with permethrin. Ticks will crawl on but fall off quickly. You can reduce the chance of picking up ticks by staying on the lawn and out of tall grass and the woods. My dogs get the Lyme vaccine each year. There's work being done on another human vaccine and it's reportedly almost ready to use.
Black flies hatch as soon as the water hits 40° to 50° and continue into November. We have 40 species of black flies but only four or five cause problems.They're a bigger problem from April into July (got bites last night) for me, and then more noticeable in October and warm November days.
We've had horseflies out for a couple of weeks. They drove us nuts in the boat last weekend and the dogs have welts on their snouts from bites. They don't seem to slow down when we use bug spray. NMLM's suggestion on tape on your hat helps a lot. They seem to prefer the tape over our skin.
Worrying won't make the pests better or worse but taking action will. Use a bug spray and a device. When it isn't windy I use a Thermacell to keep mosquitoes and black flies away. There are 1.2 million people living with pests in Maine. It's definitely manageable.
Ticks are numerous especially before the ground dries out...dontnowhy....just the way it is. Lyme disease is here...supposedly...ask a Game Warden how many colleagues have Lyme..he'll tell you no one. Ask the same question to a logger- same answer. Forester or surveyor and you'll get the same response. I make sure when they are out to brush them off while in the woods and when I get back, I check and re-check. They don't bother me. Sad to say there are many that won't go into the woods because of ticks. This year early they were prevelant early
but not bad now. Flies and skeeters are just nuisance critters.
The natural beauty of this place outweighs any negatives. Buddy and I caught 3 Browns yesterday.... 1 1/2 - 3 lbs.
Permethrin treated clothing works great. The only time I have had to brush off ticks since using permethrin is when I have worn untreated clothing. Free range poultry also does a good job of keeping the tick population down around the house.
Ticks are increasingly a problem in Maine. A multi-prong approach is best for protecting you and yours - particularly kids and pets: reduce habitat favored by ticks (tall grasses and leaf litter especially), spray skin with picaridin (or similar) and spray clothes with permethrin.
NMLM's experience is different from mine. We start finding ticks as soon as the snow melts, and I find them on me through the November hunting season. I treat clothes with permethrin. Ticks will crawl on but fall off quickly. You can reduce the chance of picking up ticks by staying on the lawn and out of tall grass and the woods. My dogs get the Lyme vaccine each year. There's work being done on another human vaccine and it's reportedly almost ready to use.
Black flies hatch as soon as the water hits 40° to 50° and continue into November. We have 40 species of black flies but only four or five cause problems.They're a bigger problem from April into July (got bites last night) for me, and then more noticeable in October and warm November days.
We've had horseflies out for a couple of weeks. They drove us nuts in the boat last weekend and the dogs have welts on their snouts from bites. They don't seem to slow down when we use bug spray. NMLM's suggestion on tape on your hat helps a lot. They seem to prefer the tape over our skin.
Worrying won't make the pests better or worse but taking action will. Use a bug spray and a device. When it isn't windy I use a Thermacell to keep mosquitoes and black flies away. There are 1.2 million people living with pests in Maine. It's definitely manageable.
Apparently there WAS an effective vaccine for Lyme disease but hysteria killed it.
Apparently there WAS an effective vaccine for Lyme disease but hysteria killed it.
It was discovered in humans THAT IF YOU GOT THE VACCINE and already had Lyme, terrible things could happen to you, like becoming a quadriplegic(like a friend of mine). The vaccine in humans sets the lyme cyst into a wild out of control stage causing rapid increase in quantity of the lyme spirochete way beyond the normal 10,000 of them.
The vaccine is essentially the same one that my dog gets.
And yes I know all about Lyme. I have chronic Lyme now, and my daughter was the 2nd diagnosed case in PA, back in 1987. I live in the woods on the coast and deer and mice and birds are everywhere. Its carried as much by mice and birds as by deer. You can be infected in an little as 15 minutes after the start of the biting. I just increase my herbal treatments when I get bitten again(at least 2 x every summer), and don’t take doxycycline unless I develop a fever, which means I was infected with one of the many co-infections which ARE LIFE THREATENING.
We have no black flies at all, and mosquitos are about normal.
P.S.: I thought you were dead. I especially like your Lark Ascending, and the Antarctic Symphony.
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