How To Prevent Pets from Lyme Disease

Its just the start of the fall season which is ripe for deer ticks carrying Lyme Disease. Lyme disease can affect you dog, humans, birds, cats and farm animals and is initiated and spreads by a bacteria called Spirochete.

Lyme Disease is also on the rise again most likely due to the warmer weather these days due to global warming, the disease carrying bugs such as ticks are living longer and breed in greater volumes.

You have probably seen warnings about the rise in Lyme disease in the recent past. Lyme can be a severe illness, and each year we see more of it in different and larger areas. The basics of the disease as well as preventing, diagnosing, and treating Lyme disease which is important to all pet owners of both dogs and cats in all parts of the country.

The symptoms of Lyme disease which is difficult to diagnose is: lameness or limping, similar to arthritis in nature. It is also accompanied by joint swelling or inflammation which can paralyze an animal overnight. If the disease carries through to the advantaged stages it will cause bladder control loss and eventual death.

Your pet can also carry the disease and not be affected by it, but they can spread it to other pets. Cats appear to be more resistant to Lyme disease than humans or dogs. If a cat is infected it will have a high fever, be very tired, and lose its appetite for food. You can see the difficulty in diagnosing this disease because the symptoms can mimic many other diseases with these similar and common symptoms.

Lyme disease is caused by a bacterial infection by the bite of a deer tick. In the northeastern U.S., deer ticks also called black-legged ticks are the primary carrier of Lyme disease but there are other specimens of ticks that carry the disease in other parts of the US especially in the western regions.

These ticks carry bacteria that cause the disease to spread from animals to humans or animals to pet dogs and cats and farm animals. They transmit the bacteria when they feed on humans or other mammals.
Fortunately, Lyme disease can be treated and prevented as most dog cures with Herbal Therapy. If the disease advances untreated it can cause severe and deadly results.
Only deer ticks are known to transmit Lyme disease. These ticks have a two-year life cycle that includes three stages. Ticks start life in the fall as larvae so small they are nearly invisible. Their first meal comes from a small animal. If that host carries the bacteria that cause Lyme, the tick will pick it up. If you find a tick, the best way to remove it is by holding its head with a pair of tweezers and firmly pulling backwards.

Never try to remove a tick by twisting it or pressing down on it or as some people. Also do not apply kerosene to a tick. This will allow it to throw back the contents of its stomach into the bloodstream of its host namely you or your dog or pet.

After removing the tick disinfect the area with swabs soaked with hydrogen peroxide, which will destroy the Lyme bacteria upon contact. In addition, you could use a diluted portion of tea tree oil or grapefruit extract also diluted by fifty percent and apply with a soaked cloth.
The peroxide may cause the fur to discolor therefore rinse it off carefully and re-apply several times.

After winter, the larvae become nymphs - pinhead-sized ticks that carry Lyme. Ticks need a meal of blood to grow into adults and as adults the females need more blood meals to lay eggs and start the cycle over again. Both the nymphs which are very small and not visible to the naked eye, and the adults can give people Lyme. Many people do not know they have a tick or never see it until it is engorged with the blood from feeding on its host which is you or your dog.

Preventing Lyme Disease :
The best way to prevent Lyme is to keep pets and their humans from being bitten. That involves several strategies which area really quite simple to put into practice.
First: Know when and where ticks are active. Deer ticks can be active in any month, however, adult ticks tend to be most active from March until June and again from September through November.

Therefore be aware now that this is the season for ticks. Nymphs are most active from May to September. Ticks prefer tall grass and shrubby undergrowth which means just about anywhere deer can roam they can be in that area.

Second: Wear light colored clothing which makes ticks easier to spot on your skin or clothing before they bite. Wear a hat and tuck your pants into your boots or long socks when in tick country. Also try not to allow your dog to roam freely in the thick brush or areas where deer are known to live.

Third: Check yourself, your partner, your kids, and your pets for ticks after time outdoors especially in the forest or where deer are known to be frequenting the area. Usually this can be accomplished by a good brushing or with a fine tooth comb.

Ticks like protected or creased areas for feeding and often attach in the groin, navel, armpits, ears, back of the knee or nape of the neck in pets or humans. If you know someone who lives alone and spends time outdoors, offer to help him or her do a tick check.

Fourth: Use an herbal repellent such as grapefruit seed extract, olive leaf extract, or myrrh oil. Other herbals are Rose Geranium, and Rosemary Oil which you can purchase at your local health food store. These will work pretty well if you put it on heavily over all your clothing and acts as a repellant. There are available sprays for pets to apply before you go for that walk in the woods to look at the trees and fall foilage. This will prevent you coming home with a few hitchhiking , blood-sucking bugs which will reak havoc on you and your dog.

It is probably wise for duck hunters to take some along for their hunting expeditio
ns to prevent lyme disease before it starts.

Especially for children herbals are safer, and kids who should not be anywhere near chemicals such as Deet the herbals can provide effective and complete prevention of American Dog ticks. Apply the repellent specifically around pant and shirt cuffs and other areas where tick might be able to crawl underneath clothing. The herbals should not be applied directly to the skin.
Most people do not like wearing dangerous chemicals on their clothes, but would rather wear herbals for a few hours than get Lyme disease for a very long and unhealthy stint wtih Lyme Disease.

Teri Salvador is a freelance writer with a site primarily on dog health issues that offers frequently updated articles on natural remedies, pet product reviews and current articles on pet foods. You will read it first on DogHealth1 before CNN gets around to covering the story. Visit: http://www.DogHealth1.com
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