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Old 06-04-2011, 11:50 AM
 
11 posts, read 25,297 times
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Hi all,

Looking for advice from those with experience. I know people living in SE Missouri - just up from the bootheel. Its a beautiful piece of the country. But I am having a hard time understanding if I can cope with the subject line problems.

Where I come from in the frigid northern US, we get the same sort of summer storms - so the MO storms don't shock me. The heat gets a little much for me in SE MO summers - and the humidity - but I think I could adapt or just stay inside in the hot months.

I like that winters are so extremely mild compared to what I'm used to. (I get feet of snow where I come from - and lonnnnngg bitter winters.) I am also used to a lot of humidity - but ours comes in short summers. Here, we get loads of mosquitos - not unlike MO.

What I am NOT used to are
: Snakes (copperheads, cotton mouths, rattlers) - chiggers, ticks and gigantic spiders. My friends properties are all fairly "natural" (read: wild) Their homes have loads of these creatures. They also have loads of poison ivy, oak and sumac climbing trees and all over the place. This is a little more than I can handle, personally. My friends hike all the time on deer trails etc - and I think it would be nice to go along someday, maybe go riding - but I'm very wary of all the ticks, chiggers and snake encounters they have every time they go out. The dogs get covered in this stuff too - and track it into the house. The cats seem to roll in the poison ivy/oak/sumac and then smear it all over you. My friend runs into about one of each of these named kinds of snakes every week - in season. Chiggers and ticks are a daily thing. The spiders --- ugh --- tremendously large they look like tarantulas - getting in the house constantly.

Is it just a fact of life for living in SE MO - all these snakes, chiggers, ticks, poisonous plants, etc? Or could one do something to make more user friendly? I only know what I experience at my friend's places. Is this the norm? If I bought a piece of land in the vicinity of my friends, is there anything I could do to keep from having all these things pop up unwanted all the time?

Thoughts and ideas please?
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Old 06-04-2011, 12:01 PM
 
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If you control the areas in which your animals roam you will not have the problem of them transfering poinson ivy and parasites to you. Fence them in while keeping your own yarn mown! Cats should not be left to roam as they are devestating on quail and other bird populations.

If you are living on the property chickens and guinea fowl are tick eating machines. Put up bird and bat houses to encourage a natural habitat to help with your insect control.

You can use frontline on your dogs to help keep the ticks off of them/kill them once on. I also use the Adam's spray on mine.

The Missouri Department of Conservation has books to help you identify native plants, vines, trees, snakes, etc... .

If you are going to be on foot use a long walking stick to aid you with snake encounters (or a shotgun).

When you do go out, spray your clothes down, wear light colored clothing and a hat, and shower down at night while carefully inspecting for ticks. If you have a spouse/significant other to help with the tick inspection more the better.

Last edited by lifelongMOgal; 06-04-2011 at 12:13 PM.. Reason: spelling
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Old 06-04-2011, 12:06 PM
 
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Thanks for the quick feedback, lifelongMOgal. For the record, I should have explained that I don't keep cats myself - my friends do. I will keep dogs though - but I don't let them run without me being there with them.

So if the lawn is kept mowed - the snakes, chiggers and ticks won't be there?

I like the people in the region - I just had such a hard time with the wildlife.
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Old 06-04-2011, 12:11 PM
 
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Quote:
Originally Posted by chattyme View Post
Thanks for the quick feedback, lifelongMOgal. For the record, I should have explained that I don't keep cats myself - my friends do. I will keep dogs though - but I don't let them run without me being there with them.

So if the lawn is kept mowed - the snakes, chiggers and ticks won't be there?

I like the people in the region - I just had such a hard time with the wildlife.
Chiggers will be there (don't sit in the grass), ticks will be reduced in mown grass, snakes as well but keep an eye out just the same. I have heard that if you have black snakes in your yard that the rattlesnakes stay away. If nothing more keeping the yard mown will let you see the snakes before you step on them! Guinea fowl attack/eat snakes too.

Stock up on poison ivy treatment and aveeno oatmeal bath in your bathroom cupboard . You may not need it but you'll regret not having it when you do!
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Old 06-04-2011, 12:15 PM
 
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I had to smile big when you said Guineas! They're top on my want list. I've heard they'll do a number on wasps / hornets too if they get the taste for 'em.
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Old 06-04-2011, 06:37 PM
 
Location: Rolla, Phelps County, Ozarks, Missouri
1,069 posts, read 2,549,130 times
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Regarding snakes: I say kill every one of the durn things you see, just don't let the Conservation see you do it. Snakes are the property of the people of Missouri, and there is no season for them, so you are not supposed to kill them. Lowe's has a product called Snake Away; I don't know if it works.

Fleas, ticks and chiggers: There are also other lawn treatments available. Follow the instructions regarding spreading; I've never used them, but I've heard they work. Fleas have been really bad the last couple of years; they've become armor plated. Frontline has not worked on our dogs. We had to give them expensive pills from the vet.

Poison ivy: A doctor told me that he could give me a shot in January or February that would keep me from getting poison ivy in the summer. I never got the shot, I just stay away from the poison ivy. A lady who raises goats told me that if you drink milk from goats that eat poison ivy it will "vaccinate" you; I can't vouch for that.

If you are planning a move to rural Missouri, I think a more important question you should ask yourself is: Can I be happy in the long run living in a place with no mall or Starbucks? On the Missouri Forum, that seems to be what transplants are far more bothered about than our storms, insects, critters or vegetation.
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Old 06-04-2011, 09:02 PM
 
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Thanks for giving me some ideas, Ozarksboy.

No worries on the malls or starbucks. That's not me. There's a walmart 30-40 minutes from where my friends have property - and that's plenty for my shopping requirements. I grew up raising chickens, rabbits, dogs and horses. Still get excited going into a farm or feed store. There's an Orschleins (sp?) in town near the Walmart and I make a bee-line for that when I'm down there. I guess those are my starbucks substitutes. LOL

I did a little digging - and it sounds like between guineas, chickens and turkeys, they should eat all the ticks and wasps. The guineas should help with the snakes - or at least squawk like mad and let me know there's some problem there with a snake. If I fence the main yard - and keep it mowed short that should help. I figure the birds should also be pretty good spider eating machines. That leaves me with the chiggers yet. Will look into your suggestions - and maybe something will come up.

We just don't have those creepy crawlies up here - I'm not used to 'em.
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Old 06-05-2011, 02:07 AM
 
Location: MO
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All good ideas, but most of the things listed are indeed facts of life in SE Missouri. The ticks have been pretty bad so far this year so definitely check yourself every time you come out of the woods. I never have any trouble with chiggers but I think that it's pretty uncommon to not have problems with them.
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Old 06-05-2011, 08:20 AM
 
Location: SW Missouri
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Chiggers - Skin So Soft is a great repellent - and you will feel good until your start sweating, then you smell good and stink at the same time - really confuses the crap out of the bugs. As well as the people around you.

Mosquito - Citronella candles burning when outside - keep a pail of water close by - in the summertime the hills around here can be a firebox and it also gives the mosquito's some place to lay their eggs after they have snacked on you. If you are going to spend the next week itchy, it might help to know when you threw out the bucket of water, you killed about 3,000 of their offspring. Cover yourself with DEET containing products - I doubt the government has tested the long term effects on DEET so do so at your own risk. The government claims DEET repels mosquito's, but having lived here all my life I doubt 'anything' but citronella repels them - they probably just get high on the stuff and fly into trees.

Bats are especially good at catching mosquito's but for some reason many people freak at the thought of having swooping bats in their yard at dusk. I find them very cool to watch, and since they hunt strictly by 'sonar', hillbilly humor forces me to occasionally toss something into the air to see if I can get the bat to swoop it. Like tieing a string to the leg of a June bug and holding on. Hill people had to find your own entertainment before their was electricity.

Ticks - In the good old days, doctors used leeches to 'bleed' a patient to cure them of ailments, today we have ticks. The fatter the tick, the healthier you should feel. If you don't believe me, look at a Missouri country dog in the summer. If you can get him to stop running around that is. If one is fearful of donating some of their blood to nature, use the Skin So Soft mentioned above to keep them off. For those of the female persuasion, there is a particular week of the month that hiking outside can be, shall we say, especially hazardous. This is also the week each month your better half may recommend a long walk in the woods. Its common sense when you think about it but some find out only after they feel their skin crawling with hundreds of seed ticks and have to take a bath in bleach and water to get some relief.

Poison Ivy - old timers will tell you if you eat the leaf of a poison ivy plant at the beginning of spring, it will make you immune. I wonder how many people show up in the emergency room each year after actually trying this? Advise on this one is to learn what the plant looks like and simply stay away from it. Easy advise to follow unless you are one of those that as a teenager always went out with the kind of person your dad said stay away from.... then you might as well get use to scratching before you cross the state borders.

Every bug leaves a different bite and you will have to master the scratch that most effectively deals with it. There is the side to side 'where the heck did this rash come from?' chigger scratch, to the bone digging up and down 'what the h--l bite me?' mosquito stroke.

You have been given some good advise prior in this thread except my fellow Missourian's are failing to tell you that owning a flock of free running guinea's is probably the quickest way to meet a neighbor there is. God was in a foul - that is with a 'u' not a 'w' - mood the day he created the guinea. It is a cross between a chicken and a prehistoric creature with absolutely no enduring features. Farmers will cross a busy highway in their tractor to run over two things - a snapper turtle or a guinea. They have a face only a mother could love and few do. Besides road kill, guineas make good target practice for children and their first BB gun, a woman with her first 30-06, or a crew in their first M1 Abrams battle ready tank (that is if they can overcome the uncontrollable urge to run them over first). They eat, they crap, and they make a blood curling squawk that after hearing for awhile makes one want to jump off a cliff - or take the family for a Sunday drive - off a cliff. But go ahead and buy some guinea's - and God help you!

And at the end of this nauseating narrative, I have left the best for last. Yes the cause of all man's troubles and the instigator of unholy sin. No, not the gullible woman who actually 'took' advise from a talking snake many years ago, but the belly crawling snake - who is still as ticked off about the whole Garden of Eden incident as we men are. Generally when people think of snakes, they think of a John Wayne movie with the sudden spooky rattle sound and John quickly dispatching aforementioned devil with his handy six shooters. Ah Hollywood. A rattler is one of only three basic poisonous snakes commonly found in Missouri. The others are the copperhead, and the cottonmouth. The cottonmouth, also referred to as the water moccasin, is by far the most aggressive of the lot, which can be very disconcerting when one falls from am overhanging branch into ones boat. While snakes in general will only attack if surprised, or their warning (rattle) goes unheeded, the cottonmouth will chase down and devour small animals and children. Ok, maybe that is a stretch and I am thinking of another horror movie - but like poison ivy, if you leave the snakes alone, they will leave you alone. Simple as that.

But always carry an AR-15 with you, just in case it wasn't a movie I am thinking of.

Last edited by SW Missouri Dave; 06-05-2011 at 08:52 AM..
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Old 06-05-2011, 12:55 PM
 
29,981 posts, read 42,772,743 times
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Quote:
The cottonmouth, also referred to as the water moccasin, is by far the most aggressive of the lot, which can be very disconcerting when one falls from am overhanging branch into ones boat.
Are you serious? Cottonmouths in trees? I've been too busing looking down to keep an eye out for rattlers & copperheads in the woods, now I have to worry about cottonmouths springing to attack from trees? I usually don't worry about running into them unless I am near a water source.

Are you pulling our leg or serious?

I have to stick with the DEET products. There is nothing about Skin So Soft that smells remotely good to me. Infact, it is worse than being attacked by the cosmetic gals with pewfumes at the department store, IMO. YMMV.

Pretty funny commentary on the Guinea fowl Dave. I'd never heard of anyone disliking them. I have heard that they are more dependable on warning of strangers approaching than the best yappy watch dog. I have heard that keeping them alive can be a challenge as they aren't supposed to be the brightest birds .....more like the 10 watt CFL.
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