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My cats get lots of ticks, so I've thought a lot about tick removal.  
The best gadget I've tried is a "tick fork". (Or "tick twister")  It 
works sort of like the "tick spoons" that look like a spoon with a 
slot, but it has two tines that are bent like on a garden fork, with a 
narrow slot between them.  The goal is to slide the two tines on either 
side of the tick, with one above and the other below the mouthparts.  
Then twist (not pull) it around, and the tines squeeze the mouthparts 
together, forcing them to close a bit and slide out of the flesh.  It 
works really well on my cats.  It's much easier to place and clearly 
less painful (to the cat) to actually extract the tick than with other 
methods (tweezers, tick spoon)  We haven't had to use it on a person, 
yet, but it's certainly the tool I'll grab if anyone gets one.

I bought it from my vet for more than you'd expect for a little piece 
of plastic, but not that much in the scheme of things.  I heartily 
endorse it.

www.otom.com

Ginda
eastern Mass., zone 6
(Haven't seen ticks on the cats yet, but have started examining them 
closely.)

On Apr 7, 2005, at 10:12 PM, Charles Paradise wrote:

>  Tuesday night found tick embedded on my shoulder, small tick.  
> Neighbor had a go with tweezers pulling out the mouth left in, 
> couldn't get it out.
>
>  18 months ago got an embedded tick on November 1, clearly was sick 
> after finding the tick embedded 36 hrs., did antibiotic, don't want to 
> do doxycycline antibiotic again if can avoid.  Antibiotic took lots of 
> energy away from me I haven't regained yet.  Or, maybe it was 
> whichever disease the tick then carried.
>
>  Now I read Lyme has 28-day cycle and any antibiotic administered less 
> than 28 days will fail.  The tick 18 mos. ago had a clear "halo" 
> circle around the bite, the first I'd ever seen, but this one now is 
> just red from the bite out, without the "halo".  I don't feel good, 
> but no fever, no terrible aches, slept well last night
>
>  I sent the tick to Imugen, Inc.
> 220 Norwood Park
> Norwood, MA 02062
> 1-800-246-8436
> $75/tick for species identification and testing for the bacteria that 
> cause Lyme disease,
>
>  and I have the option of having my M.D. try to pull out what remains 
> of the tick in my shoulder, but since its healed over I don't see the 
> big advantage in that.
>
>  Obviously its time to adopt a lyme strategy, which for me is:
> buy a better tick extractor   tickremover.com
> Watch for symptoms
> If rash appears, take antibiotic
> If tick tests positive, take antibiotic
>
>  Have you thought out your strategy if you get a tick embedded more 
> than 24 hours? [They say tick has to be embeeded at least 24 hrs. to 
> transmit, and the lab tells me still only deer ticks carry lyme]
>
>  Charlie Paradise
> Massachusetts
>   
>  
>  
>  
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