Tick Treatment for Acreage?

[Matt Schrum]

Long story short, we're moving back to Oklahoma and just put in an offer on a house with 5 acres of thick oak. It's a nice place and we're hoping the inspection later this week goes well.

While there, I walked maybe 200 yards into the woods (there wasn't that much grass-- the oak leaves mostly smothered things), looked around for 5 minutes, and walked back out. I bet I pulled or flicked off 20 ticks right after that. I didn't have any bug spray on, but I was expecting 2-3 ticks, not 20. Have any of you folks encountered a similar tick problem and successfully combated it?

I've heard spraying permethrin works (though I do dislike killing too many non-tick insects if it can be avoided) and getting guinea fowl or chickens could help (it's unlikely we'll do this). In addition, I've seen suggestions of putting a 3' wide warning track of gravel around your yard (as the ticks are unlikely to cross that due to sun, heat, and lack of foliage)-- but that doesn't really help with the ticks in the timber.

Any help or advice is appreciated. Thanks!

[Alan Rutherford]

I don't think you're going to do much to the foliage to deter ticks. You're going to have wear your tick defenses. If you've seen the suggestion about the gravel space then you've probably seen all the other advice about long pants, tuck them into socks or boots, etc. Permethrin on boots & clothes is supposed to help. Ticks don't jump or fly. They climb up from the ground or grab you as you brush against low foliage, which I avoid if I can.

Guinea fowl are supposed to be great predators of ticks but I'd rather have ticks than the noise guineas make. Reducing the local rodent population might help but certainly isn't a cure.

In our experience, which can be one or more ticks a day even without spending much time outside, vigilance is easier than prevention. That is, you can't stop them but you can remove them. It's not urgent since they need hours to transmit disease. Almost 100% of the ticks we find crawled up to the first reasonably comfortable spot they found or elastic, whichever came first. Pull them off with tweezers no matter what clever alternative method someone else likes. A flashlight, a willing partner and a total lack of modesty help greatly. We sometimes need a magnifier to decide whether a tiny spot is a tick or not. During tick season I often look closely at small itches in private places before I scratch.

Not my favorite thing about the jungle we live in, but not as bad as it sounds, either.

[Tom M King]

I always get a kick out of what people call "acreage".

I use this, and it works good: https://www.amazon.com/HI-Yield-3133...gateway&sr=8-6

That's the cheapest stuff that I've found to be effective. It mixes 1-1/2 oz. per gallon. 20 gallons will cover a lot of ground.

A 40 gallon sprayer stays on a 7' rotary cutter, which stays on one tractor during growing season. There is an ATV boom, which would work great for your place, welded onto the back of the cutter. That boom will cover a 30' swath, but doesn't stick out past the sides of the cutter.

I have two pumps on that rig. One for the boom, and another smaller gpm one with higher pressure for use with a wand. Either can be controlled from the tractor seat with switches.

It takes two applications a season, here, to keep ticks at bay. I don't spray our dog yards, or other yards with 38, but there is a much larger buffer zone around the outside kept with it. I also spray on the grounds of several museum houses that we keep up. Since I've been doing this spraying, there have been no complaints of ticks, fleas, etc.

[Tom M King]

Another tool you will probably enjoy having there is a 13hp Billy Goat blower. It's on wheels, and will clear about an 8' swath with each pass. They make self-propelled ones now, but weren't available on that size when I bought ours 20 years ago. Leaf control in our yard is just blowing them into a convenient gully outside our yard.

[Matt Schrum]

I always get a kick out of what people call "acreage".

It's at least 300 acres less than what we hope to end up with, but technically it's an "acreage", so it's a step in the right direction . I was mostly trying to get across that I wasn't just spraying my front yard in the city. I appreciate the advice on the spray, Tom-- I've bookmarked it, so hopefully it'll come in handy.

Alan, my plan was already to keep to long pants and socks and apply permethrin to whatever clothing made sense. Glad to see I'm on the right track. Thanks!

[Steve Eure]

Slow burning fire does a good job here in the South. Control burn.

[Tom M King]

Keeping all the leaves blown away from where people walk, mostly with the Billygoat, and spraying with that spray, lets anyone walk, barefoot with shorts, and insects are not a worry. I don't lose any sleep over creating tick free zones. When we first built our house in the woods, you could sit on the low deck, with feet on the ground, and watch ticks crawl up your legs.

We even went the Bantam chicken route for a while. That worked, but we made the mistake of introducing a rooster, and they multiplied to the point that we had competing roosters in trees early in the mornings. Spraying is a lot more peaceful.

edited to add: Tractor Supply sells some small, towable sprayers that would be worth looking at. Pump sprayers get old fast, but are still necessary.

[Jim Andrew]

I have a small farm, 800 acres, too much to spray for ticks. Along with the crick, which runs diagonally through the place. When I was young, we had hardly any ticks, and now we are over run with deer. These ticks are called deer ticks. Maybe that is why we have so many ticks. Some guys use vanilla, say it keeps the ticks off, I use some Repel brand Lemon Eucalyptus spray on my socks shoes, and pant legs.

[Tom M King]

I use that same spray when I think I need it, and I haven't had a seized tick in years. I only spray around the outside of our dog yards, and where people walk a lot.

[Andrew Seemann]

I have a small farm, 800 acres, too much to spray for ticks. Along with the crick, which runs diagonally through the place. When I was young, we had hardly any ticks, and now we are over run with deer. These ticks are called deer ticks. Maybe that is why we have so many ticks. Some guys use vanilla, say it keeps the ticks off, I use some Repel brand Lemon Eucalyptus spray on my socks shoes, and pant legs.

Deer ticks are the ones you need to worry about too; they are the ones that can carry Lyme's. Regular dog ticks are gross, but around here at least they don't usually transmit disease.

[Perry Hilbert Jr]

We had a terrible problem with ticks and skeeters when I bought this farm. The prior owner hated to mow lawns and let everything grow wild. Underbrush was growing less than 10 feet from the house. Firt thing I did was chop back the bushes and underbrush. Kept the lawn mowed out to about 50 feet from the house and things got much better. Now the house and barn are surrounded by pastures and fences. Grass is kept under 6 inches and trees were permitted to grow but underbrush was always cut out. We now have 5 more acres of pasture and far fewer ticks and mosquitoes don't bother us when we sit out at night. We tried raising guineas but the noise they make was too obnoxious. The area around the barn and outbuildings is pretty steep, so we let the sheep graze all that down. My Mrs. wouldn't permit spraying anyway. We did run temporary wire fence and left goats trim back the bushes before were moved in to clean things up. Goats do a great job of eliminating under brush.