Facts About Ticks

Places Your Pet is Likely to Pick Up Ticks
1. Dog Park – Ticks will hone in on the warmth, carbon dioxide, and odors that your dogs give off. They will hide in the grasses, shrubs, and other furry friends.
2. Yard – Yes, your pets can pick up ticks in their very own yard. Many other animals that carry ticks come in and out of your yard, like squirrels for example. These animals are carriers for ticks. And yes, ticks will hide out in the grass and shrubs.
3. Home – You and other human visitors can carry ticks into the home. If you have other furry friends that come to visit, they can carry ticks into the home.
4. Dog Kennel/Daycare – Again, when your pets come into contact with other animals, there is the chance the other animal may be carrying ticks.
5. Veterinary Office – This may be a place that you take your pets to keep them healthy, but the waiting room is the perfect place for your pet to come into contact with other animals who may be carrying ticks.

Products That Protect Against Ticks
1. Spot-On Treatments – These are also called topical treatments. You can get these treatments at your veterinary, the pet store, grocery store, or online. These products are applied to the pet’s fur. The product contains ingredients that repel and kill fleas, ticks, as well as mosquitoes. Not all topicals provide the same protection, so make sure that you are reading the label. The product spreads over your pet’s entire body, depositing into the sweat glands o the skin. This is where the active ingredients will be released over several weeks’ time to repel those pesky ticks.
Tevra Brands provides several topical treatments for your fur babies. Tevra Brands produces the generic alternatives to the two largest veterinary brands, which are Frontline Plus™ and K9 Advantix II™ for Dogs. TevraPets offers Activate II, while Vetality offers Avantect II. Both products contain Imidacloprid, Permethrin, and Pyriproxyfen, which are the active ingredients found in K9 Advantix II for dogs. This product repels and kills fleas, flea eggs, ticks, and mosquitoes. It also kills lice and repels biting flies. This product is available for dogs.
TevraPet also offers Firstact Plus and Vetality offers Firstect Plus. This product is available for both dogs and cats. Both products contain the same active ingredients that are found in both Frontline Plus for Dogs and Frontline Plus for Cats. This product kills fleas, ticks, flea eggs and larvae, and chewing lice.
2. Oral Medications – These medications are pills that are given to your pet once a month orally. These medications do not have the ability to repel ticks but require the tick to actually bite the poor animal to kill the tick.
3. Shampoos – Shampoos contain medicated ingredients. These help wash away adult ticks and is a short-term solution. Shampoos are not a preventative measure for your pets. Your animals can still get ticks after using a shampoo. The shampoos must be repeated about every two weeks.
4. Collars – Collars contain concentrated ingredients that will kill and repel fleas and ticks. Collars also last a long time, but they can smell quite strong.
TevraPet offers a collar called ProAct. This is a vet quality flea & tick collar for dogs that kills both fleas and ticks. It comes with two collars lasting 12 months in total. The collar contains time released technology that optimizes the release of the active ingredient to maximize efficacy with minimizing potential dermal reactions.

Why Protect Your Pet from Ticks
1. Your Pet’s Health – Ticks carry zoonotic diseases, which means that not only can they harm your pets, they can harm you and other humans. One of these diseases is Lyme disease. This disease can be a devastating disease for both humans and pets. Ticks can also cause anemia in smaller animals that have less blood to feed on. There are not vaccines available for all the tickborne diseases, so it is best that you prevent it before it becomes a problem.
2. Your Pet’s Happiness – Ticks are a nuisance. Your pets do not have to suffer from being a blood meal for a tick. A tick’s bite can cause skin irritations and infections. This can affect your poor pet’s mood.

Takeaways
Ticks can cause serious illnesses not just for pets, but for humans also. You have options as to what will work for you to prevent ticks from biting your companion animals. It is also helpful to treat your yards against tick infestations. Dogs are more susceptible to tick bites and tickborne diseases because they are more social and outside more. Tick bites may be hard to detect and signs of a tickborne disease may not even appear for 7 to 21 days or longer after a bite. Using a preventative solution is the only way to make sure that this does not happen to your pets. While tick season may only last a few months out of the year in some parts of the country, other parts are all year long. Make sure to protect your pets so that you can enjoy your time and have adventures with your pets.
*Note: Nellie is being treated for fleas & ticks with the TevraPet Activate II.