Tag: permethrin

Jumbo Perch and Thunder-Chickens: it’s Spring in the Northeast

Posted on by Dave Barus
  • With spring rain and wind, staying warm and dry requires planning.
  • When hunting: Stay free of deer ticks, learn about using Permethrin, Picaridin, and Rynoskin.
  • Hunting or Fishing: Keep your feet dry and warm. Check out Vaprtrek insulated boots and light Merino wool socks. 

By Forrest Fisher

When the wind and rain occasionally find a vacation stay in Western New York, experienced hunters like Gary Huber change tactics to find the birds. This is Huber’s second spring-season bird this year, filling his 2-bird season limit.

It has been an excellent year for rain gear and umbrella salesmen. So, getting out there with rod/reel or hunting gear requires a combination of preparation, proper gear, and strategy to stay dry, safe, and productive. You know the old saying: Failing to plan is a plan for failure.

It’s spring in the North and East and elsewhere. It’s chilly. It’s rainy. It’s “uncomfy.” If you’re fishing or hunting, invest in high-quality, insulated, waterproof boots. Add a thin polyester sock as the first layer on your foot, then a thin pair of Merino wool socks before inserting your foot into the boots. What boots?  I’ve been wearing the Irish Setter VAPRTREK models because they are light and comfy. I wear out at least one pair a year. They are my everyday boots for when I play outdoors.

If you’re in the turkey hunting woods looking to find a thunder-chicken, get some gaiters too, and spray them up with Permethrin to keep the deer ticks from finding a doorway to crawl up your leg with your back against a tree. While you’re in protection mode, add some Picaridin to your neck and any other exposed skin. Sawyer Company sells both products; they are inexpensive at under $15 each. To stay chemical-free, consider a Rynoskin armor suit as your underwear cover. Even no-see-ums can’t get through. I wear them hunting, fishing and gardening because going through a cure for Lyme Disease in the human body is no fun at all. Ask me how I know? The Rynoskin full-body suit costs about $150, worth every red cent.

The bottom line is that there is nothing like wet feet to END outdoor fishing, hunting, camping trips, or whatever you’re doing outdoors. Stay dry, stay warm, and enjoy the experience.

Next, be smart about where you’re at and what you’re doing. Remember, it’s wet. Get a small dry bag to stow in your rainproof backpack to protect your wallet, keys, and phone.

When the jumbo perch in Lake Erie are biting, chilly weather with wind and rain can take a backseat, but keeping dry with the footware and outerware is important. Captain Hans Mann photo

You’re ahead of the curve if you wear moisture-wicking clothing layers with breathable, waterproof outer layers, such as pants and jackets (like Gore-Tex). Get these garments in the color you need to be where you are. Add a wide-brim hat or hood and waterproof gloves if you need them, and life will be cozy and dry. Happiness is.

It has been windy and stormy from the Midwest to the Northeast for weeks. Right through the start of many opening day fishing and spring turkey hunting seasons all across the north country regions. If you don’t postpone your fishing trip because of wind and waves, and then decide to go hunting instead (no big waves in the woods), use a buddy system. Don’t go alone if possible – but at least tell someone where you’re headed. Trees can crash down in heavy wind at times. So, look around for solid trees to be protected from that type of event before sitting down. Be safe.

Jumbo perch are schooling in Eastern Lake Erie and modern sonar can find them. Captain Daryl Glassner photo

Fishing for Lake Erie jumbo perch in heavy winds can be challenging and downright brutal. Just ask big perch prize winner, Mark Mohr, from the annual Southtowns Walleye Lake Erie Perch Contest, always held on the first weekend of May. Mohr caught the biggest perch of the tourney with a 2.74-pound jumbo, but his fishing buddies Mark Woelfle and Charter Captain Rob Ebersole admit that their fingers felt frozen and their feet were wet. With heavy wind and high waves, it’s difficult to keep the fishing lines down and even more challenging to keep the boat still enough to drop down 2-hook and 3-hook fishing rigs with minnows in 55 feet of water depth.

If in the turkey woods, remember that turkeys move less in the wind. Set up in wind-protected hollows, field edges, or lowland woods, and be watchful. Don’t call too often, sounds move in funny ways in the wind. Plus, the rain quiets the forest floor, so you must listen and watch more carefully than usual.

On any day, it’s pretty exciting when a bird in the far distance answers and you realize he is answering you! You wait a few minutes and reply back with your call, and they return their volley of turkey jabber. It’s honest, exciting fun. In this light of turkey sound creation by us humans to fool a tom turkey into thinking we are sexy turkey hens waiting around the next brushpile for them, I want to share a new discovery. About a year ago, I met Brian Benolken, owner of Cutting Edge Game Calls. He shared with me, his new turkey-calling toy and explained how inventor Eric Steinmetz created one of the most unique turkey box calls ever made. I have one now and discovered the call is totally innovative and is deadly-useful if you hunt turkey. Constructed in a 4-way configuration of old-fashioned sounding boards made from four different wood species, it is called the “4-Play Turkey Call.” The paddle is a sort of a game-like joystick that allows variable pressure and angle change to provide never-before-possible turkey friendship, mating and boss-bird leadership sounds. All in one call. The 4-Play provides clucking, yelping, cackling and cutting sounds. Any of the four sounding boards can be accessed by rotating the paddle around one end of the call. The resulting notes can form a composition of turkey singing harmony unmatched by one call ever before. My wife actually gets upset when I practice with this call in the backyard. It attracts turkeys, a variety of wild birds, and some of those critters that feed on birds and turkeys (fox, coyotes, etc.). Deer know that turkey are keenly aware of predators, so deer come strolling through the yard too. Remind me to take this call when deer hunting during archery season this fall! 

Numerous Wildlife Management Areas in New York and other northern states are open to the public and provide access to diverse habitats for turkey hunting. These are good places to hunt those tasty wild thunderchickens right now.

By equipping yourself with the right gear and adapting your strategy to the weather conditions, you’re setting yourself up for success. Whether you’re fishing or hunting, the thrill of a successful and safe outdoor experience is hard to match.

Gotta love the outdoors.

Scott Jordan with youngster, Ethan Cole, with a successful youth turkey hunt. The 2025 New York State Youth Turkey Hunt weekend ended this past Sunday. Photo by CRCS Outdoors

Turkey Hunters, Deer Ticks, Lyme Disease – What to do?

Posted on by Dave Barus

Pic 1 of 1: Comparison of Deer Tick life stages over a dime: (L to R) larvae, nymph, adult male, adult female. Photo courtesy of Chautauqua County Health Department

  • Deer tick bites are painless. You must look to see if you have a tick embedded in you.
  • Deer ticks carry Lyme Disease. Lyme can mimic more than 300 other diseases, frequently causing misdiagnosis.
  • Use Permethrin on your clothes and Picaridin on your exposed skin for protection. 
Comparison of Deer Tick life stages over a dime: (L to R) larvae, nymph, adult male, adult female. Photo courtesy of Chautauqua County Health Department

 

By Forrest Fisher

Lyme disease has more than doubled in several parts of the country since 2014. Three of my seven grandkids became unfocused a few years ago, fatigued, and complained about aches, pains, and headaches. They were 7, 14 and 16 years old. Too young for the usual rites of arthritis passage and similar ailments.

In short, we eventually discovered that all three had Lyme disease. Identifying and finding a remedial cure took three years and $2,000 per month. The mysterious cause of the sickness was Lyme disease. Lyme can mimic more than 300 diseases, allowing patients and untrained medical staff to misdiagnose this killer disease before it is diagnosed correctly.

The disease is caused by a bacterium (Borrelia burgdorferi) and can be spread to humans when an infected black-legged tick (also known as a “deer tick”) attaches to a human. Deer ticks are so tiny through all four stages of their 2-year life cycle that people may never see them or recognize them as a threat to their health. But these little critters are seriously dangerous.

Deer ticks typically live in shady, moist areas at ground level. They cling to tall grass, bushes and shrubs, usually no more than two feet off the ground. They also live in lawns and gardens, especially at the edges of forested areas and around old stone walls. Ticks cannot jump or fly onto a person. They usually wait in vegetation and cling to animals or humans that pass by.

Deer ticks can also be found on your moored boat at the marina! I have seen this occurrence twice now. They cling to seagulls and birds, then drop off when the birds stop to rest on the gunnel of a moored boat at the marina. Stay aware.

Once a tiny tick gets on the skin, it climbs upward until it reaches a warm, protected body area. Under arm areas, the groin, behind the ear or on the nape of your neck, then burrows in. Their bite is painless. You have to look to see that a deer tick has made entry. Look for a little bump in your skin that wasn’t there yesterday. If you go outside, check yourself every day. Moms and dads, a word to the wise to check your kids. Shower off after coming inside.

Warmer weather is upon us, and it is an excellent time of year to get outside and explore the natural beauty of your community. Be prepared if you are a fresh mushroom picker, wild onion seeker, woods hiker, camper, turkey hunter, or gardening enthusiast.

Permethrin is a synthetic molecule similar to those found in natural pyrethrum, which is taken from the chrysanthemum flower. It is available at Cabelas.
Picaridin delivers a similar effect as DEET, repelling troublesome insects for up to 8 hours. Reapply then. It is available at Cabelas.

My family and I have learned to depend on Permethrin spray to coat our exterior clothing and boots. One application of permethrin on clothes lasts six weeks, even through the wash. Not only does it repel insects from clothing and other fabric products, but it will actually kill ticks, mosquitoes, chiggers, mites and more than 55 other kinds of insects. Permethrin is a contact insecticide that is non-toxic to humans.

We also use Picaridin on our exposed skin areas, which is applied each outing. Picaridin needs to be reapplied every eight to 10 hours. Picaridin effectively repels mosquitoes, ticks, biting flies, stable flies, black flies, gnats, chiggers, and sand flies.

Bass Pro, Cabelas, Walmart and drug stores everywhere carry these inexpensive Permethrin and Picaridin products made by Sawyer Labs.

For non-chemical protection, purchase and wear a Rynoskin suit (www.rynoskin.com). The whole suit weighs about two ounces. It is thin, light, and breathable, but deer ticks and similar 8-legged arachnid critters cannot get through. A suit consists of socks, lowers, uppers, gloves, and a head cover. The suit eliminates worrying about spending too much time outside, especially for turkey hunters. Rynoskin protects against mosquitoes, ticks, chiggers, no-see-ums, black flies, sand fleas, gnats and many other biting insects. Rynoskin is safe and chemical-free; It is designed to be worn underneath clothing, providing comfort and stealthy movement. It is machine washable and dryable

May is Lyme Disease Awareness Month. To prevent disease, promote wellness, and protect the health and safety of the community, health departments across the country recommend checking for and properly removing ticks, understanding Lyme disease symptoms and knowing when to call your doctor. If you spend time outdoors, here is one website video to learn more about being outside at this time of the year: https://chqgov.com/environmental-health/news/video-protect-yourself-against-ticks-and-lyme-disease.

Anti-Tick Tactics – Protect Yourself

Posted on by Jim Low
This national Lyme disease map from the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) provides an illustration of the approximate distribution of predicted Lyme disease risk in the United States. Note that Western New York is at high risk.

Warm weather is back. Hooray!  Break out the camo clothes and turkey calls, fishing rods and binoculars.  It’s time to enjoy the great outdoors again, but as you pursue outdoor fun, don’t forget that there are some less-than-desirable things pursuing you as well.  Foremost among those things are ticks, there are several types, but deer ticks- also known as black –legged ticks (Ixodes scapularis), have recently become known as the “bad boys.”  They’re very, very tiny, hard to see, and their bite is nearly painless.

For as long as I can recall – and I can recall more years than like – ticks have been a source of concern beyond the “ick” factor.  Back in the day, we worried about tularemia and Rocky Mountain Spotted fever.  More recently, we have added Lyme disease, Lyme-like disease, Ehrlichiosis, anaplasmosis, babesiosis, borreliosis and probably a few others that haven’t crossed my radar yet.

Tick identification and relative size by stage in comparison. Courtesy of the Center for Disease Control (CDC).

The good news is that many of us will not get any of these maladies.  The bad news is that the chances of getting them are NOT ZERO and the consequences are potentially life-changing.  You want to do everything you can to reduce your chances of getting any tick-borne disease.

The additional good news is that there are excellent and very effective means of avoiding ticks.

Your first line of defense is clothing.  Long-sleeved shirts and long pants make it harder for ticks to reach your skin.  The wide variety of lightweight fabrics that wick moisture away from the skin makes it much more pleasant to dress for tick defense than it used to be.  Choose light colors to make it easy to see ticks that hitch a ride before they find an opening in your defenses.  You can further enhance clothing’s protective value by tucking pants legs into boots or using rubber bands to hold cuffs snug against your ankles and wrists.

These clothing measures are most effective when combined with chemical repellants.  Far and away the most effective of these is permethrin.  This chemical is lethal to ticks on contact, and they know it.  Just drop a tick on permethrin-treated clothing and see how it scrambles to get off!

Permethrin-based repellants are amazingly effective and because they work on all mites too, they also provide protection against the dread chigger mite.  Permethrin has low toxicity to humans and is poorly absorbed by skin.  It’s odorless once it dries, however, it is a toxin.  So the recommended method of usage is by spraying on clothing.  This is the best of all possible approaches anyway.  Once sprayed on clothes, permethrin-based repellants remain effective even after several washings. It’s actually not the water and detergent that remove it, but rather abrasion.  So to retain tick repellency as long as possible, wash garments on gentle cycle and line-dry them, rather than running them through a clothes dryer.

Do be aware that cats are more sensitive to permethrin than dogs or other mammals.  If you have cats in your home, keep them away from areas where you are spraying clothing, and change clothes before inviting Fluffy up on your lap.

I buy my permethrin in bulk online and treat several changes of clothes at once.  I lay the garments out on the driveway and spray one side, let them dry for a few minutes and then turn all the shirts, pants and socks over and repeat the process.  I keep treated clothes separate from the rest of my wardrobe so I know which ones to wear to the woods.

The next-most-effective tick deterrent is DEET (N, N-Diethyl-meta-toluamide).  Experts aren’t sure how DEET works, but there’s no question that it does.  Like permethrin, it is supposed to be applied to clothing, not skin.  Unlike permethrin, DEET comes off in the wash. It melts plastic, which is another significant disadvantage, and it smells awful and continues to smell as long as it is effective.  You don’t want to get this stuff in your eyes, but it works.

If you want real protection, go with permethrin or DEET.

Of course, even with the best of protection, you are going to get bitten occasionally.  This doesn’t have to be a problem. Your biggest risk of infection comes when a tick has fed for a while and regurgitates some of its stomach contents into your skin. This is most likely to happen some time after it attaches to you, so early removal is very important.

It’s hard to see every place on your body, so it makes sense to do a tick check with a friend as soon as possible after outings. (Insert joke here.)  When you find a tick DO NOT use one of the old methods of removal, such as touching it with a hot pin or covering it with a turpentine-soaked cotton ball. These methods will almost certainly cause the tick to regurgitate, which is the last thing you want.

ticktactics3

Instead, use the following procedure:

  • Use sharp, needle-style tweezers or your fingers covered with rubber gloves or a piece of tissue paper to grasp the tick as close to the skin as possible.
  • Avoid squeezing the tick’s body.
  • Pull the tick slowly and steadily straight away from the skin until it pops free. This can take a few minutes.
  • Disinfect the bite area and tweezers/fingers with alcohol.

Then you have two choices, save the tick for medical analysis and review (place it in a tissue and insert in a pill bottle) or destroy the tick.  If you live in an area with high density to Lyme disease, save it and get the tick analyzed, and get to a doctor.  If not, it’s up to you.  I usually drop them in a jar of alcohol, a fire, etc.  They’re nasty critters and deserve it, or you can just flush it down the toilet, like my wife does.  If you are removing lots of ticks, it’s handy to use a piece of duct tape to corral them until you decide their fate.

Most tick bites are no big deal. However, you should keep an eye on them to be sure you don’t develop a bullseye rash at the bite site. If you do, get to a doctor for treatment.  Tick-borne diseases don’t mess around and you shouldn’t either.

It’s actually possible to have serious medical problems even if you don’t get one of the more dangerous tick-borne diseases from a bite.  Pay special attention to any tick bite on the head or neck. The proximity to the head and its sensitive neural tissue poses an increased risk of serious side effects from tick-borne diseases.

Besides the tick-borne diseases listed above, some people are particularly sensitive to the substances that ticks inject into bite victims, just as some people are extra sensitive to shellfish or peanuts.  For these unfortunate few, any tick bite is extremely unpleasant and some can be dangerous.  Tick toxicosis begins with reddening and swelling at the bite site.  If you get a reaction that goes beyond the usual slight redness at the bite site, seek medical help right away.  It’s not worth the risk of having it get worse.

Under no circumstances let fear of ticks keep you from enjoying the outdoors.  Be prepared by taking the proper precautions and enjoy the outdoors.

Protect your Pet – Homemade Flea and Tick Spray

Posted on by Forrest Fisher

It’s hiking season, camping season, turkey hunting season – it is TICK SEASON too!

These ”black-legged ticks” (Ixodes scapularis) are known to transmit Lyme disease are often carried by mice and other hosts. Photo from Hardin Library for the Health Sciences, University of Iowa

With folks all over the country heading to the comforts of the woodland country in spring, people and pets often complain of flu-like symptoms, aching joints, painful laziness and a host of other issues a few weeks after returning home. Dogs and cats too, can get a nasty disease known as that has recently Lyme disease.

Lyme disease is contracted from a microscopic bacteria transferred to pets and people from the bite of an infected black-legged tick (also known as deer tick).  The largest majority of these ticks are carried about by mice and other rodents, not deer, though deer can also carry them too.   The thing to know about today is that May and June are the two months each year when the nymph stage of these ticks transfer from mice to other hosts.  They feed for about 24 hours (burrow in and suck blood) and this is when they deposit any possible disease infection they may carry – like Lyme disease.

The nymph stage ticks are nearly invisible – smaller than the head of a straight pin, and their bite is nearly painless.  If you have a high pain threshold, you might not even detect it.  The tick nymphs will transfer to dogs, pets and people from many places, but the most common is high standing grass or bushes, like when you’re hiking in fields or trimming your front bushes.

The nymph critters await their host in a sort of open-leg position and have sensors that await the touch of a possible passing host (your leg, your dog, etc.), then attach like sticky bubblegum to dry paper.  Then they climb to soft skin areas and burrow in.  These areas can be anywhere, but are often the groin, armpits, back or the nape of your neck.

protectpet2For people, there is one prevention aid that is lab proven to deter the pests, that is the use of Permethrin (https://sawyer.com/products/permethrin-premium-insect-repellent/) to spray your clothes (not your skin).  Spray the open exterior ends of your pants, shirts, exterior of socks and the exterior of your shoes.  Let dry.  Ticks hate the stuff and will fall off if they should attempt to find your leg.  This protection is good for seven washes.  Needless to say, wearing shorts and hiking in high grass is not recommended.  Sorry.  Wear light colored clothing to allow easy visual detection of the dark colored ticks that may opt to attach on your clothes.

For dogs and pets, there is a simple and effective tick and flea formula that is currently on a Facebook page by Cindy Diane (https://www.facebook.com/cinlight2) that uses a combination of the home cupboard ingredients to control the tick and flea pests on pets, though I use it on myself everyday too.  Ingredients: 8 oz apple cider vinegar, 4 oz warm water, 1/2 tsp salt, 1/2 tsp baking soda and you’ll need a spray bottle.  Mix dry ingredients first, then slowly add to wet as the vinegar and baking soda will react slightly.  Put into spray bottle and spray pets down.  Be careful not to get in pets eyes and ears.  There are additional insights on washing the pets and using this formula, to see them, visit Cindi Diane at the link above.

It’s turkey season, it’s hiking season, it’s camping season, it is tall grass growing season.  It is TICK SEASON too.

protectpet3

Lyme disease is a life-long disease if not detected early and identifying this disease is complicated.  If you are bitten by a tick and can recover the tick, save it for pathology.  Then get to a doctor for clinical evaluation and request doxycycline immediately.  Also request a blood test and insist that it be sent to IGeneX Lab in California (http://www.igenex.com/files/should_know.pdf).  There is an extra cost for this test and the cost is not covered by many insurance companies.  Get whatever the usual tests that your doctor recommends and then also request the IGeneX test.  Do yourself a favor and pay for it.  The option is not worth the difference!

In my recent experience with Lyme patients, this lab is the one lab that can identify if Lyme is actually present in your system – then you can be properly treated.  There are other blood tests that claim they also work, but they are not as reliable from what current Lyme patients have shared with me in interviews directly.

Remember too, ticks carry may other nasty disease pathogens. The best cure is prevention.

Stay aware, stay protected, stay safe!