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So I went hiking yesterday with our lab puppy. She is still 7 months old and I love her to death.

Halfway through the hike I started noticing the ticks. After taking 20+ off me and her both I gave up and just tried to get through the hike as quickly as possible.  When we got back to the house my wife and I started working on her with tweezers and in the end took off some 30+ ticks which are now dead and floating in a lovely glass jar with some finger nail polish remover. Surprisingly given the number we took off of her and how many I saw trying to crawl up my leg there were none actually on myself. Wearing long pants and copious amounts of Picaridin it seems really did help.

Here is the question situation. We use Frontline Plus on both our dog and cat. It had been a month since the dogs last treatment so I guess that is why I did see some dead ticks this morning around her sleeping area, but others managed to get their heads in yesterday while we were hiking. They currently sell .5% permethrin spray through Sawyer at REI, and from my military days I know this stuff works and kills ticks DEAD. It says you shouldnt use it on bare skin though, only apply it to clothing which I am also familiar with. However I have just discovered that over the counter lice treatments (RID) use a 1% permethrin solution and are meant to be applied directly to the scalp.

For the chemists on the site.....
A) Whats the difference? Why can the 1% solution be applied to a scalp but the .5% solution (the weaker one right?) only to be applied to clothing and if you get it on you, they threaten you with tails of your future children having two heads.
B) Could I spray my dogs legs with either of these solutions the next time we go out into the woods to help her combat tick infestations?
C) Could I spray her legs with Picaridin? I couldnt find anything on google about any dangers in use with pets. It seems DEET is a big no-no as animals are very sensitive to it, so I thought Picaridin might work better.

Dogs are good with much purer does of permethrin than that. Cats aren't even slightly tolerant, and if you treat your dog with just a low dose spray, you must keep your cat away from your dog until after you have washed it off. I can't stress this enough. Even a tiny tiny dose can kill a cat. Also bear this in mind if you treat your clothes with it.

http://www.petplace.com/dogs/permethrin-and-pyrethrin-toxicity-in-dogs/page1.aspx

going to go out on a limb and hang myself but I am guessing that:

#1 - the spray's inactive ingredient evaporates quickly after contact which may result in a higher than .5% concentration left over on the surface of what you are spraying.

#2 - RID is more of a shampoo/cream that does not evaporate as easily so stays at a steady 1% concentration.

Im wondering if you have to actually wash it off the dog after being outdoors and having it on the dog (which would wash off the oil based Frontline for the rest of the month as well) or if once it dries if its safe for the cat and dog to be in contact? Same with the clothes. Im wondering if once treated they need to be kept in the basement away from the cat or if once it dries the cat can rub up against it and not be poisoned.

Why cant they make something like an animal version of DEET that you can spray on at the start of the day and reapply as necessary (like after the dog swims in the pond) to keep the ticks off like we do with people?
Im still trying to find out if there is an research related to dogs and picaridin. Hoping that, that might be the answer.

This is why I loathe ticks. I would wipe them from the Earth if I could and the consequences to the biosphere be damned.  :drill:

Where the hell do you live that on a short hike you and your dog can pick up over 50 ticks? Where ever it is, I am never going there.

I hiked all around Southern California when I was younger, and I never managed to pick up more than a handful, like 3 or 4 maybe.

I don't go places where ticks would be. Ever. Nature can bite it.

We were on Twin Lakes Loop around Indian and Celina Lakes in the Hoosier National Forest in south east Indiana.
I was able to identify 4 separate species on the dog and I.

Deer tick (aka black legged tick)
Lonestar Tick
Dog tick (both American and Brown varieties)

Living in what was basically the middle of the woods when I was young, I don't get super bothered by ticks, although they're icky ewwy when they're fat and juicy.  Almost every evening one of us would go over the dogs thoroughly with a comb and pull the ticks out with tweezers.  Us kids used to get our heads searched for ticks every night, too.  Evidently, ticks are especially dangerous to kitties. 

Are they really uncommon in NW Oregon? Because I have never once been bitten by a tick, and I used to be outdoors 16+ hours a day.

Pacific Northwest in general does not have much of a bug problem.

I get a lot of yellow jackets, but that seems to be about it.

NW is bad for fleas, but west of the Cascades is too wet for ticks.  Over 3000 feet in the Cascades or Olympics is virtually bug-free, not even much of a mosquito problem.  On the other hand, slugs a foot long....

--Dave

Did you get the ticks off of your cat?  If you have exhausted all other options, I have one.

Explosives, right?

Which is one of the many reasons that makes the Olympics some of the best hiking in the land.

Does telling you about the ticks that infest the hill country that surrounds Austin one of those things like that hail we should have informed you about?

It's not the ticks so much as the chiggers.  They make life miserable for a few weeks.

If the ticks fall from the sky like tiny black bullets that can pierce my skin and punch holes straight through metal... yes.

I cant wait for the headlines about mutant space ticks falling from the sky in Austin.

Ahh this reminds me of that holiday in Austin...

Round one of the War on FTCs over, Sky 1 FTCs 0. (Forest Tent Caterpillars)

Hate 'em, and last year was really bad. Couldn't use my patio during the migratory period. This year I'm armed to the teeth with chemicals and showing little regard for fauna. The guy who owns most of the trees behind me apparently doesn't give a shit (given the massive outbreak there), so I also trespassed over there and nuked the baby nests in the area that was shiveringly awful last year. Was hoping for frost last night, that would be game over for this year's shenanigans, but no luck.

Next is chemical barrier time, I'm just wary of hurting the birds that eat them at that point.

Also, round two of the War on Ants has begun, they're feisty fuckers. Won't know how it's going for a few months, hopefully I'll destroy a nest or two with my poisons.

Can't you try that duct tape and vasoline method first?  There's also adhesive barriers that have no chemicals.  If you use poison, especially during the day, you're also destroying bees.  That's bad for everyone.

Bees can suck my cock.

Hey, I love bees. Love honey.

But I also love my patio. Duct tape and vasoline would stop them from climbing up the trees, sending even MORE over into my yard to infest my back wall and patio.

So fuckabees, I'm napalming some sumbitches!  :ye_gods:

I've seen large areas around here that are absolutely covered in those things and they really are ugly.  I can't even imagine how much poison it would take to get rid of them.  My uncle who usually didn't mind poisoning the earth and all it's creatures, put bird houses up everywhere.  That really delighted my aunt who LOVES birds but drove their dog into a crazy mad frenzy for ages.  It worked, but only to a degree.  There were still places where they were plentiful.  I've heard that if you use the chemicals at night, it does less damage to honeybees.  Don't know about wildlife.  You might end up with dead things all around you.   :uhrr:

Are you being "Feet" again?  I didn't get the memo.

No.  I'm trying to find an avatar that Sky won't duck fap to.

And you think Daffy can't have a foot fetish?

So went out again Sunday and did 12.5 miles over 4 hours in the German Ridge area of the Hoosier National Forest.
Cool thing were all the old family cemeteries hidden back among the woods, where the original homesteads used to be. Creepy thing is how many damn kids are buried in therm. Prior to 1900 half the people buried seemed to be kids under 10.

Used a squirt agent on the dogs legs and belly that morning before heading out in addition to the Frontline Plus she was already sporting. Much better results, Only pulled three ticks off of her when we got home.

The trail itself sucked though. To many damn horse packers. Horses turn trails into mud pits of death.

Yeah, too late.

About safer chemicals for FTCs, you need something with Bacillus thuringiensis var kurstaki (Bt). Unfortunately, the only stuff I can find locally is the 'kill all wiggly things' napalm stuff.

Maybe you should get a professional to do it?  Is it even legal for you to put that stuff on your neighbour's trees or doesn't he care as long as he doesn't have to pay for it?

He doesn't care, I'll be lucky if he doesn't clear cut the forest in the next couple years. He's already taken a lot of trees out. It's his land, whatever, I'm just concerned about him running his heavy machinery back there and compacting the roots to my trees, because I've got a couple that are 60' or so, which means pretty extensive root systems.

Anyway, professionals cost money I don't have. I'll always go to the professional if I can, but I'm tapped out. On the upside, learning a whole lot of things about a variety of subjects is pretty interesting.

Rule #1 of home ownership: there is never enough time nor money.

It must be rather small.

Just before you hit the trail try dusting just a bit of Sevin Dust on the paws and legs.  It won't do much for the ticks falling from trees but will help with the little bastards from underbrush and the ones making their way to the armpits. 

Check with your vet to see if you can apply the Frontline Plus a few days or a week earlier than what is listed on the box to help accelerate killing off the ones that are already there.

We learned the same thing you did, don't let the frontline application slip.  Playing catch up once the protection drops is a bitch.

Sweet, sweet Sevin.