Hi,
 
First, I want to say that I have never been so overwhelmed with love and
concern in my mailbox from such a great group of people.  You are so
special and caring.  Thank you so much!
 
I wrote that we lost Little Girl and that she returned... with LOTS of
ticks!  Believe it or not, she came home on her own!  I would never have
believed it!  She came home while I was making more LOST posters to put up
about her!  It was 12:30 AM and I told my husband to check the front door
because someone was scratching... he thought I was hearing things and
wishful thinking too.  But when he opened the door... in she runs!!!
She had the look of "There's no place like home!"
 
It was a miracle!!! Truly!  I would have never thought she would find her
way back... because she is like the Energizer Bunny.  She goes and goes...
almost in a straight line.  I was sure she was in the next county by then!
 
But she was covered in ticks!  There were about two dozen on her.  You also
helped there!  Most said putting vaseline on the tick would smother them
and make them pull out...but we had no vaseline.  So another suggested
alcohol or peroxide... so we tried what we had: Peroxide.  IT WORKED!  We
saturated a cotton ball and held it on the tick and as he backed out, we
usually got him!  It also worked as an antiseptic too.  Then we had some
old ferret flea and tick shampoo and bathed her and more died!
 
We took her to the vet today (remember the holiday weekend...kids only get
sick on holidays!) and she removed all the other ticks and heads.  She said
the peroxide was a wonderful idea because when we did that, even if the
head stayed in, we prevented an infection until we brought her in.  She was
convinced we had did so well, no antibiotics were needed BUT keep a good
watchful eye... and we are.  We also had her two brothers checked out and
all seem well... tick-wise!
 
The vet told us something else I didn't know... that FLEAS were more of a
danger to her than ticks.  She said if those would have been fleas biting
her in that large amount, she would have been one sick lady.  So this is
a good testimony to the flea prevention called PROGRAM that we use on the
kids, because she had NO FLEAS!!!
 
There has been one side story to this saga... her two brothers attacked her
when she got home!  Both of them started biting her and dragging her and
she was starting to wonder why she came home!!!  It has taken us two days
to get them all integrated again... had not expected that reaction by the
brothers!  Someone told me that since she is female, the pecking order
had to be reestablished.  It was when she started fighting back that they
started to let her alone...but we were there ALL the time making sure she
was OK (the big bullies..ha)!
 
Thanks again for everything... this story had a happy ending.  Let's all
pray everyone's does!
 
Kiss your fuzzbutts for me,
Pam & Mark Howell
 
INDY:  "I told ya she would be back..."
BEAR:  "Does that mean I have to give back the socks and bells?"
[Posted in FML issue 3069]