Squirrels and Ticks.

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I remember pulling five or six off me at a time when I was a kid.

Some years are definitely worse than others. It also seems like when it's bad, it's bad everywhere. I'm sure some areas are worse than others though.

This spring was about the worst I've ever seen it. I pulled at least 30 off of Puppymonster, and at probably 15 or so off of me. I found a few just crawling around in the house. I hate those fucking things.

I'm either really good at locating prime breeding ground, or I smell really good to a tick.

I wouldn't even know where to start with guessing how many I've had on me over the years.

See, now I find this odd as I never once saw a tick as a kid growing up in western PA in the 70s. I actually never had a tick on me until some time around 1989-90 when I was a junior or senior in college here in NEPA. We played in the woods all of the time as kids, too. Mosquitoes and deer flies, yes. But ticks, never.

Personally, I'm thinking that the rise in ticks in the 80s could possibly be tied to the ban on DDT in 1972. That would give 10 -15 years for the population of ticks to rebound after having been knocked back. 15 years is plenty of time for the population to rebound, especially in conjunction with the expansion of suburban sprawl during the same time period, which is suitable habitat for both white footed mice and white tail deer, both reservoir hosts to Lyme disease.