Eileen, I felt so very sorry for him - he just wanted to sit with me and be cuddled and I wanted a magic wand to make him feel better.

I saw that TW was suffering after her outing yesterday, so I hope that she is resting. Those ribs really are taking an awfully long time to heal.

DD I don't seem to have a problem - this is serious that you are still suffering. Do we need to send a techy person over to help you?

They do not!!!!

They bite to feed simply. They dig in with their mouths to suck blood. When they suck they swell up and when they are full they drop off, to live off the blood in them until they are empty again, then off they go in search of more blood. After three days they drop off. I used to find them splattered on the floor sometimes when they had dropped off indoors.

They are just a mouth on legs. Hatch out in the grass etc and seek BLOOD. Lay eggs in the earth etc. Not on dogs or cats or us.

Some carry disease; that is mostly deer ticks and we are getting some Lyme disease here in Ireland now. Sheep ticks are innocent. Heavens if they carried disease or infection I and all my cats and myself would be dead. I never even use disinfectant on the cats and dogs.

There is more danger in fiddling about with the bite site than with it itself.

As long as you get the whole thing out and with practice you can almost hear it letting go.

Took me many months of angst to reach this realisation so please believe me. I have no doubt I will be seeing ticks soon here