1. whole 9 months is the tick season. From March to October. Southern Germany in particular is considered a risk area.
2. contrary to a misconception ticks do not lurk on trees, but rather in tall grasses or bushes. What can help? Closed shoes, tuck your trouser legs into your socks and light-coloured clothing to make ticks easier to spot.
3. every fifth tick carries borrelia. Borrelia are bacteria that can cause Lyme borreliosis in humans. The bacteria can infect the nervous system, joints, organs and tissue. There is no vaccination against this infectious disease. Bikers in particular should be on their guard, as they are constantly travelling in the realm of ticks.
4. borrelia get through only enters the human body after ten hours at the earliest. Removing the tick in good time is therefore one of the best ways to protect yourself from the dangerous Lyme disease. TBE viruses, on the other hand, enter the human bloodstream immediately after the tick bite. Possible consequences: Meningitis and encephalitis, which can also be fatal. The TBE vaccination is recommended as the most effective form of protection.
5th mission in life: Ticks spend 99 per cent of their lives waiting for a carrier. They can survive for up to two years without feeding on blood.
6. favourite zones: Four places on the body are particularly favoured by ticks. 1. between the legs 2. at the back of the knees 3. under the arms 4. on the neck
7. that ticks It is a dangerous misconception that the best way to remove a tick is to twist it out. The so-called "head" of the tick should be grasped as closely as possible with tweezers and pulled out gently. Gently because the mouth parts, usually referred to as the head, should not be torn off. Under no circumstances should you try to remove the tick with your fingers. This is because there is a particularly high risk of squeezing the tick's body, which could cause the tick to empty its intestinal contents into the wound.
8. a fully sucked female tick weighs around 200 times as much as before the blood meal. The tick needs up to ten days to absorb this amount of blood.
9. out of 295 German counties are 145 considered a TBE risk area (as of May 2015). The south is particularly badly affected.
10 Ticks go through three stages of development: Larva, nymph and adult tick. Even larvae (0.5 millimetres in size) can infest small mammals.
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Laurin Lehner
Editor
