I took my two oldest daughters (2 & 4) on an overnight camping trip last night. It was great...but the camp grounds were littered with ticks (VERY small, like pepper flakes) I removed one from each of us before nightfall and one each after returning home....despite wearing deepwoods off.

The question is....I took the "new - less than a year old" family mini-van to transport all of the "car" camping necessities and after the wife got in the car later today she had two ticks crawling on her.

Is there a safe and non-toxic way to try to get rid of this plague of ticks? I have an infant that is less than a month old and don't really want to have to "bug bomb" the car.

Any and all suggestions would be helpful.

Thanks in advance,

Ask your vet (or a vet if you don't have any animals) about Frontline in a spray bottle. It'll be expensive, but it kills ticks better then just about anything else. You might ask your vet for advice, but that's what I would suggest.

Maybe permethrin spray like the kind used to treat clothing, tents, and mosquito netting would work. Or, if you just wanted to treat the carpets and not the seats you could buy some cheap white sheets and cover the seats temporarily. I do this in my car for when i take my dog hiking cause not only does it protect the seats but the white just makes it easier to spot ticks. Just a thought.

I wonder how ticks handle high heat? Seems like in the summer, I find formerly pesky bugs dead in the car after it bakes for 8 hours in the parking lot on a sunny day. I wonder how much heat ticks can survive? Anyone know?

Thank you all for your suggestions. While googling...I located information about permanone and thinking I didn't really want to spray the seats....treating sheets and draping them is an Excellent Idea!!!!!!!! I think that is what I'll try as soon as I can find some of that permanone/permethrin...

Thanks again.

Frontline spray will only kill where you spray, I think. Ticks like cracks, etc. Miss the cracks....

Ticks and tick nymphs have survived an hour of high heat in a clothes dryer. One site says that tumbler-style clothes dryers can reach 345F/175C (http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=729373)
Previous posts here have indicated that interiors of black cars in AZ (I think) were only 130-140F (IIRC).

Personally, I would use the bomb. I would suspect that the possible danger from the ticks is worse than from the bomb. I would buy one from the vet. A lot of the topical flea stuff that they sell has been tested better than those sold over the counter, although I don't know if the same holds true with the bombs. Ask your vet.

Just use the bomb as directed, then open all the windows and let it air out for a couple of hours. If you have a garage, leave all the windows open for a few days. To be safer, use the "old" car for the baby for a week or so.

Or ask your pediatrician.

Sue

Open the door on the vehicle, take five gallons of gasoline and douse the interior. Step back and light a road flare. Toss it in the vehicle and run.

I HATE TICKS!

Ticks don't like heat if they don't have a water source, they dehydrate pretty easily.

Once again, a safe, non toxic way to rid an area of such vermin would be ultrasonic sweeps. I don't know what the sweet spot is on ticks, but I betcha 18Khz to 40 Khz at 100 db or so would send them packing pretty quick, or melt them.

If they are still in the nymph stage (souunds like it from the size you described), then they won't be egg laying, and in a couple weeks they would descicate or seek life elsewhere in search of something to live on.

How do you get rid of ticks from your clothes if you can't see them?

is it possible to wash clothes with bleach to kill them?

I'd have to go with the bomb as well. I imagine it will smell pretty bad in there for a while.

My wife and i were looking at some rural property for a retreat last year and we both had ticks on our legs later that night. My wife was pretty freaked out by the whole ordeal.