Louise here the Lone Star tick! I originate from the deep south in Texas but I have a super power, I can travel. Ticks are cool creatures if I do say so myself. We have all these legs that can attach on to wildlife, people, dogs and even birds. Personally, I love flying that’s how I got into Canada, I jumped on some migrating birds and hitched a ride.
Some of my cousins have also started hitching rides up here, the only problem is Canada can get a bit cold for us. If it goes down below -40 I could die! But lucky enough, I know how to bury myself deep into the ground and can hibernate the winters out.
Ticks like us love to travel about on other animals like wildlife and birds, how fun is it to ride on the side of a moose or fly up high in the sky. The thing is we like to hitch rides and if we hitch a ride with lets say a nice dog friend, we can come into your house. Houses are a perfect place for me to hibernate. I can feed off your dog’s blood and live all warm and toasty.
Sneaky veterinarians are prescribing flea and tick treatments to all dogs now a days so some of my friends have died off. We have to bite the dog to get the medications and then we can die very fast. No good for me and my friends! But I can understand why you don’t like us; we carry a lot of crazy diseases. Coming from warmer climates we can have a lot of diseases you don’t have up here. Some of my friends have Lyme disease, some have anaplasmosis, a lot have ehrlichiosis and some even have rocky mountain fever. In regular terms it means we carry a lot of bad things that can make your dog sick but can make you sick too! There are so many of my cousins that live up here all year round too that carry these diseases. I have a friend Doug the American Brown Dog tick, Bob the Black Legged Tick, Wanita the Western Black Leg Tick even my cousin Leo the Lone Star Tick live up here now. The warmer the north gets the more we ticks can move into Canada. I mean what’s not to like about Canada, the Rocky Mountains, Niagara Falls, downtown Vancouver looks like a great visiting spot!
So I guess your veterinarian is right to prescribe your pet preventative flea and tick products because we can make your pet very sick. Right now I’m still living at the veterinarian clinic but once it warms up above 4 degrees I’m moving out into the wilds of Sylvan Lake. I’m really starting to enjoy this town what with the lake so close, baseball fields to roam around in and lots of pets walking around all summer long. Lousie the Lone Star Tick out!!!
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