Spring may be known as prime tick season, but ticks can be active anytime the temperature is warm enough, even on sunny winter days. With tick-borne disease and illness risks continuing to increase, the best thing you can do is proactive prevention. In addition to what you do for yourself before and after being outside, there are also things you can do around your home to reduce the risks of ticks. Here are some proactive things you can do to get rid of ticks:

1. Use preventative treatments on your pets.
2. Add tick-repelling plants to your yard.
3. Maintain your lawn and clear debris.
4. Remove dense ground cover.
5. Be aware of where you have your woodpiles.
6. Reconsider how you use bird feeders.
7. Use tick tubes.
8. Create a border.
9. Install a sturdy fence.
10. Repair damaged retaining walls.
11. Put in a concrete patio.
12. Make some upgrades to your existing patio.

1. Use Preventative Treatments on Your Pets

Our pets are prime targets for pests like fleas and ticks. Anytime your dog or cat goes outside, they risk coming back in with some sort of bloodsucker attached. Using preventative treatments on your pets can help deter ticks, fleas, and other pests, reduce the risk of your animal bringing something back inside, and also help keep your pet healthy. Consistent use of preventatives provides your pets with protection from fleas, ticks, and heartworms.

2. Add Tick-Repelling Plants to Your Yard

In addition to using tick repellents when you are outside, you can reduce ticks around your patio by planting bug-repellent plants as a border around your patio and your yard to help drive them away from that area.

Eastern Bee Balm, Mountain Mint, and Sweetfern are some Pennsylvania-native plants that help repel ticks and other insects. They are also less attractive to deer, which can help keep deer ticks further away from your home. Garlic, rosemary, lavender, and more are also plant options that tend to repel ticks.

However, if you have pets that spend time out in your yard with you, make sure you are only using plants that are safe for them, in case anything is ingested. For example, lavender and garlic are toxic to cats and dogs. So, it’s better to stick with other plants and other methods to get rid of ticks if you have cats or dogs.

3. Maintain Your Lawn and Clear Debris

Ticks thrive in long grass and debris. Longer, unkempt lawns and piles of stuff outside are prime places for ticks to hide. On top of improving your backyard, simply by maintaining your landscaping and keeping grass on the shorter side, you can reduce the ticks in your yard.

Clearing out debris also removes the places where they can hide or where they can hunker down to hibernate when temperatures get too cold for them to move around. If there is nowhere for them to hang out in your yard, ticks are more likely to go somewhere else or not make their way in the first place.

4. Remove Dense Ground Cover

Clearing out debris also means clearing out dense, invasive ground cover, like vinca or Japanese pachysandra. These types of ground cover create moisture-rich, damp, and dark mats that wild mice and other pests love. Because these animals tend to be carriers of other pests, like ticks and fleas, making your yard less attractive to them can help you reduce ticks, too.

If you want some ground cover in your yard, a native option like Pennsylvania Sedge is a good option. This is a low-maintenance ground cover that tends to keep itself tidy. More importantly, it does not create the dense, damp mats that mice love.

5. Be Aware of Where You Have Your Woodpiles

Another one of the proactive things you can do to get rid of ticks is to be aware of where you are stacking your woodpiles. Dark, dank, and humid piles of wood are attractive places for ticks to hide.

You won’t be able to control all the moisture with your outdoor stacks of logs, but you can be more cautious of where and how wood is stacked to make sure the environment stays brighter, drier, and less attractive to ticks. A good rule of thumb is to stack wood 20 feet away from your home and to make sure it is in a dry, sunny area.

6. Reconsider How You Use Bird Feeders

You may love watching the birds visit the feeder in your yard, but the birdseed is attractive to pests and tick carriers. You don’t have to remove bird feeders entirely, but you do want to pay attention to where they are and when you use them.

Placing bird feeders away from your home keeps any tick carriers coming after the birdseed away from your home, too. You can also adjust your feeding schedule to provide seed from December to April, and then remove the feeders during peak tick season to help reduce the risk.

7. Use Tick Tubes

If you’re in an area where ticks are abundant, you can use tick tubes around your property to help reduce the tick population around you. Tick tubes contain permethrin-treated cotton, which mice will take and use for their nests. It doesn’t harm the mice, but it does kill the ticks on them.

8. Create a Border

If your lawn shares a border with a wooded area, or you have a partially wooded lot, take some time to create borders between your lawn and the wooded areas. Ticks are not big fans of crossing dry, rough surfaces. By putting in borders of rocks, gravel, or wood chips, you create a physical barrier that ticks are less likely to cross. A 3-foot border is a good guideline.

9. Install a Sturdy Fence

Although a fence may not do much against insects or all pests, it is a barrier and does create an obstacle. This is a key benefit of a privacy fence. In addition to giving your backyard some privacy, a tall, sturdy fence can also help make your yard less attractive and less accessible to tick carriers like deer. Keeping animals and people out of your backyard is one of the biggest reasons to add a fence around your backyard. In this case, it can also be a proactive thing to do to help keep ticks out of your yard.

10. Repair Damaged Retaining Walls

If you have retaining walls or stone walls on your property, take some time to look over them. Are they in good shape? Do you see any damage or areas where moisture collects? If you have damaged areas on your walls that create damp, dark recesses, these are prime places for ticks to hide and can attract them.

Some of the big benefits of installing retaining walls are managing water runoff in your yard and preventing water from pooling in your yard or around your home’s foundation. However, if they become too damaged, they can contribute to issues instead.

If you have damaged stone walls around your property, whether they are retaining walls or stone walls as garden borders, take the time to replace these and repair the seal. This keeps these elements working the way they are supposed to and also makes them uninviting to ticks and other pests.

11. Put in a Concrete Patio

One of the things you can do to get rid of ticks is to reduce the things that attract them to your yard. If you’re already considering outdoor living spaces for your yard and don’t already have a patio, putting in a concrete patio next to your home can be a great option. Not only does this give you an outdoor living space to enjoy, but it also cuts down on the grass and organic debris where ticks can hide.

When the concrete patio is attached to your home, it can have the added benefit of creating an extra buffer zone. Location is just one of the things to consider for a new patio. Ticks may still find their way onto the patio or into things stored on the patio, but concrete is less attractive to them than grass or debris. Another benefit is that concrete and stamped concrete are easy to clean. So, if you need to, you can easily hose down the patio and clear it off.

12. Make Some Upgrades to Your Existing Patio

If you already have a concrete patio, making some upgrades to your existing patio can be proactive things you can do to get rid of ticks. If you’re already planning to update or remodel your outdoor patio space, this is a great opportunity to include some other helpful things. A patio cover is a common way to upgrade a patio.

Including electricity and a ceiling fan can also improve comfort. Although it doesn’t do as much to keep ticks away, the airflow can disrupt the flight pattern of other insects and help keep bugs away from your patio. Elevating your patio so there is more distance between the surface and the ground can help keep ticks away.

Improve Your Yard and Your Home

These are some proactive things you can do to get rid of ticks around your yard and home. Keeping up with maintenance and home improvement projects can help keep your yard and your home looking great, while also making it less attractive to ticks and tick carriers.

If you are interested in installing a fence, adding a patio, upgrading a patio, or doing something else around your home, contact Zephyr Thomas at 717-399-4708 to schedule a free estimate. Whether it’s a home addition, interior or exterior remodeling, or handyman services to help you with some maintenance, we can help!