Schnapsie asks: Shirelle, why are tics attracted to our kind, that is the canine family?
Oh Schnapisie, did you have to ask this?! Now I’m going to have nightmares all night!
For a dog, ticks are just about the worst thing there is. They latch onto us, spread disease, drink our blood, and are impossible for us to scratch off! While we always appreciate what our humans do for us, handling ticks is one of the most important and valuable things people can ever give us. So please:
– Do what you can to prevent our getting ticks
– Find ticks as soon as possible when they’re on us
– And when you do find them, get them off of us in a big big hurry!
But your question is about why ticks are attracted to dogs in particular. Well, the answer is… they’re really not. But they are only attracted to mammals. They don’t care for birds or fish or reptiles. Just mammals, such as cows, deer, humans (yes, I said humans!), and of course dogs. Believe it or not, they actually wait around in grasses for us, and find us by the smell of our breath! Then when we walk by, they drop onto us. Now of course if they land onto a person’s arm or face, that person will see them right away and flick them off. So it makes sense that they tend to find comfortable spots where they’re warm and hidden in thick hair or fur. And for most of us pooches, that means everywhere on us!
I don’t want to put all sort of creepy scary stuff on here, but if you want to learn more information on preventing or dealing with ticks on dogs, a couple of great websites to look at for are:
http://www.bigpawsonly.com/dog-ticks-health.htm
and
http://dogs.about.com/od/dogandpuppyhealth/a/ticksondogs.htm
But before I go, I do need to bark loud about one thing. Handsome loves watching all these old movies about people who turn into bats and suck the blood out of other people. And then all these girls I know are absolutely crazy about this “Twilight” guy who’s handsome and glitters in the sun – and sucks people’s blood. Now I hate to be a downer here, but the truth is, when you talk about ticks and mosquitoes and leeches and so on… Bloodsuckers are horrible! They’re nasty and ugly and disease-ridden and… and they suck your blood! That’s just gross!!
