I've removed several hundred ticks using soap on a wet cloth and doing one counter-clockwise rotation on the tick. No lyme, tick-borne encephalitis so far. Key thing is to check after every hike, keep checking their favorite places (where the skin gets thinner and softer) and check before you scratch something that itches.
Having an easy to use method which doesn't need special tools also helps by being able to immediately remove them.
> Key thing is to check after every hike
There's the common advice to wear long pants & tuck them into socks. But at times I've found the exact opposite: short pants are fine.
Why: ticks can be hard to find on clothing. So you get home, inspect legs etc, and (later) a tick crawls from pants onto your leg & you may not notice.
Bare legs otoh make it trivial to check for ticks regularly during a walk, and/or when you feel something crawling up your leg. Since they're not yet attached then, a flick of your finger & they're off.
Soak your pants socks and shoes in permethrin and this isn’t a problem.
Just be careful doing this if you have cats as pets.
I don’t have cats but from what I’ve read, you just need to keep them away from it until it dries.
Ive seen conflicting reports regarding safety of permethrin and cats.
Some say "neurotoxin". Others say "neurotoxin till dried".
Frankly, I'll keep it away in any form. I dont want to harm my cats. Even if it means that I'm a human pincushion to mosquitoes and ticks.
Maybe it depends on the formulation or maybe it’s just be down to what the particular manufacturer has actually tested.
They make flea collars for cats with permethrin (I found out just now) so it can’t be that toxic. If you’re really worried just get a pair of hiking pants and boots and keep them in a catproof tote.
Why the soap? Does it loosen the grip of the tick?