Anywhere that you find ticks on cats can be a difficult issue to deal with. However, if your cat has one or more ticks on his ears, you'll have a particularly challenging situation ahead of you. Ticks are small animals that are technically arthropods, not insects. They attach to a host like a cat and begin to feed off of the host's blood. Because of their design, ticks are able to hold onto the grip that they maintain on your pet's body for a very long time and are consequently difficult to remove. Removing ticks on cats in the proper way is important in order to ensure that your pet doesn't develop any diseases, because ticks are known as major vectors of disease.
Techniques to Avoid
There are a number of prominent and popular techniques for removing ticks. However, a great many of these techniques are insufficient for some reason. This could be because they do not entirely remove the tick from your cat's ear, because they put your pet at greater risk of disease or for some other reason. When you remove a tick from your pet's body, it's very important that you remove the entire animal. Failure to do so can put your pet at an increased risk of contacting one of the tick's diseases.
The popular method of suffocating the tick with nail polish remover is not a good one to use. It can cause damage to your pet's ear and will not sufficiently remove the entire tick's body from your pet. Similarly, touching the body of the tick with the hot end of a recently extinguished match is also not a good method for eliminating a tick from your cat's ear. Many other home remedies will be effective at removing parts of the tick, but will not be sufficient to truly remove the tick.
Techniques to Use
The best way to remove a tick is to purchase a professional veterinary removal system. These are available at most vet offices and also at pet food and supply stores. They will create a sanitary condition for your removal process and will make it as easy as possible to remove the entire tick body.
If you wish to try the removal at home without one of these kits, you should use a good pair of tweezers. Carefully grab the tick by the head, or as close to the head as possible, and remove it from your pet's ear with steady pressure. Be very careful not to damage any of the other parts of your cat's ear, as these are very sensitive.
Act Quickly
It's very important that you work quickly to remove ticks on cats. Ticks can be left in a pet's skin and cause a number of potentially very serious health problems. Consult with a vet for more information.