[neverdem]

Deer ticks are readily noticable when they bite. They are continuously painful.

Pain is usually not mentioned as a symptom. You're welcome to explore the following links from the CDC and IDSA.

Lyme Disease Symptoms

The Clinical Assessment, Treatment, and Prevention of Lyme Disease, Human Granulocytic Anaplasmosis, and Babesiosis: Clinical Practice Guidelines by the Infectious Diseases Society of America

[vetvetdoug]

FWIW...the ticks evade the detection of the host for a couple of days while they prepare a pool of blood using their secretions to anesthetize the area and cause anticoagulation of the blood. After a couple of days the ticks then engorge themselves and go from a pinpoint size to the grape size...Ixodedes(sp) or deer ticks are no exception but balloon out in size to a lesser degree. Pain is only a problem while the ticks are engorging and the anesthetic no longer works in the area due to the blood pool reduction....I have noted some real painful animals with embedded ticks in between the toes and in the ears..The dogs and horses are so painful they will not let one handle the area or pull the tick...I suppose it is also some method to allow the ticks to stay feeding in the area a little longer...

[spunkets]

"Pain is usually not mentioned as a symptom."

The pain comes from the tick bite itself. In addition to the fact that the deer tick puntures, digs in and sets off the nerves by stretching the hole, the deer tick's saliva gets in there and is a major cause of the pain. Wood ticks don't cause that kind of pain, because their saliva doesn't cause hte same response. As I said above, I've talked to over 200 people regarding their experience. Many of them had lyme. I've had over 150 deer tick bites this season alone.

One can miss the initial bite, if they're bitten when they're active. They'll miss the crawling sensation, and the needle stick when they start the bite. They continue to bury in deep, and suck. After an hour, or so, the pain will begin.

I couldn't see the second link. The first one was a gov link. They're generally overly simple, and basically say, "go see a doc". Of course those are lyme sites. say they were about west nile, would they describe the experience of a mosquito bite? I noticed some small children can't feel the things land and stick. Most adults can, and they feel the bite afterwords. I've had over 25 today alone and felt each one.

With regard to the pain caused by tick bites, if you search and find quality sites on ticks, you'll probably find a note about a deer tick's saliva. With regard to the pain in a lyme lesion, I don't see how anyone with a normal immune system and nerves wouldn't notice the at least an itch, but more likely the pain from the broken capillaries and local inflamation. The nerves should be set off from that.