Ticks & Bugs

The use of repellents can be a highly effective way to prevent tick bites and reduce the risk of getting any number of tick-borne diseases including Lyme, babesiosis and anaplasmosis. Although there are many products on the market, Permethrin is the only product that provides effective, long-lasting protection.

Permethrin is to be applied to clothing, including footwear, NOT skin. Highly effective at repelling/killing ticks. Effectiveness lasts through multiple washings. Pre-treated clothing is also on the market. This is a good complement to skin-applied repellents. EPA’s position is that treated clothing poses no immediate or long-term effects to toddlers, children, pregnant women or nursing mothers. Check out this short How-To video on applying Permethrin:

There are a number of permethrin products designed for different applications. Consumer should be careful to select product specially formulated for application to outerwear/camping gear.

Treating Clothing

Shoes

Apply permethrin to your footwear every four weeks. This is very important during the summer months: nymph stage deer ticks, the size of a poppy seed, live down in the leaf litter, and the first place they attach to are your shoes.

This is a great FIRST line tactic, as nymph stage ticks are responsible for 85% of all tick-borne diseases in Massachusetts.

Clothing Brands

Several different brands like InsectShield, Columbia, L.L. Bean, REI, Sitka, and Farloh offer pre-treated clothing and gear.

InsectShield also offers a treatment service for clothes you already own.

Where to Buy

Permethrin can be purchased at the local Hyannis Country Gardens, Agway, ACE Hardware, Home Depot, and Amazon.com.

Click here to download our Repellent Guide.

Perimeter Yard Sprays

In addition to permethrin-treated clothing/footwear a perimeter yard spray creates a good 1-2 punch program.  Deer ticks are not found out in the open lawn…short grass, direct sunlight is a hostile environment for ticks.  At the edge of the yard where the grass might be in partial shade and transitions to brush, trees, leaf litter this is perfect tick habitat and is the area you want to treat.  This includes beneath woody ornamental plantings.

There are companies on the Cape that perform this as a service.  The product that they should be using is Talstar (active ingredient bifenthrin).  There are “all natural” products that are available but there are no research data to support that they are effective.  Besides being highly active against ticks bifenthrin is immobilized when it contacts leaves or soil particles so it will not wash off site or leach through the soil.  Product should not be applied around surface waters.

Applications are recommended for mid to late May and mid to late June when nymph stage ticks are active.  A fall spray in mid-October can be considered as this is when adult stage ticks emerge.

Homeowners can also do this themselves.  Garden centers carry a product under the Bonide brand.  Eight is a hose-end sprayer that contains the active ingredient permethrin.

Tick Tubes 
This product was designed to kill ticks on mice.  It consists of a cardboard tube which contain cotton balls treated with permethrin.  The product concept is that mice will remove the cotton balls and line their nest and self treat.

There were two studies done on this product. Both studies demonstrated that the product had NO material impact on tick populations. The papers can be found in the Research section of this website. It is a product that Larry Dapsis does not recommend.

Lyme Disease is the most prevalent infectious disease in Massachusetts and is now considered to be a public health crisis.  In addition to Lyme, deer ticks can carry the pathogens which cause Babesiosis, Anaplasmosis, Relapsing Fever and Powassan virus, all of which can be very serious and are on the increase.

Tick-Borne Diseases are preventable!

Want the inside scoop on ticks? You can schedule a presentation or workshop visit with Escher Cattle.

This program will review:

• the basic life cycle and ecology of deer ticks
• incidence rates and distribution of tick-borne illnesses
• a database under development on infection rates of ticks

On top of this, you will be presented with a three-point plan to avoid tick-borne diseases:

• Protect Yourself: How to avoid tick bites by choosing to wear tick-safe clothing and skin repellents before you go into tick habitat, and how to check your body for ticks and remove them after spending time outdoors
• Protect Your Yard: How to avoid ticks in your landscape without giving up on a wildlife-friendly habitat
• Protect your Pets: How to keep indoor and outdoor pets safe from tick-borne illness, and how to keep them from bringing ticks into your home

Alternate presentations and workshops on ticks can include:

• Different tick species on the Cape & Islands and how to identify them
• Building a Tick Kit: Everyday items to remove and store ticks for identification
• The Lone Star Tick & Alpha-Gal Syndrome

Escher Cattle is the new Extension Educator for Horticulture & Entomology as of November 2025. Succeeding the role of Larry Dapsis in tick-borne disease prevention outreach, Escher graduated in 2018 from University of Delaware with a B.S. in Insect Ecology and Conservation, and in 2025 from North Carolina State University with an M.S. in Entomology Systematics & Evolution. He has experience in insect identification, integrated pest management, and especially communications and outreach for all things creepy-crawly.

Contact Escher Cattle for scheduling.