How to Do a Tick Check: Tips for You and Your Pets

"The most important thing to think about when you’re doing a tick check is that you need to check the lower extremities first and then move up.”

- Dr. Thomas Mather, Tick Expert, University of Rhode Island Tick Encounter Resource Center

Perform tick checks from the ground up

After spending time in a tick habitat, it’s important to do a thorough tick check. While many recommend checking from head to toe, Dr. Mather recommends checking from the lower part of your body first and then moving up, because that’s how ticks move, from the ground up.

Places to check for ticks

Between toes
Behind knees
In the groin area
Around waistline
In the belly button
Inside elbow joints and armpits
In and around the ear
Around the hairline
On the scalp

Dr. Mather notes that it’s especially important to check areas where your clothing meets, or binds closely to, your skin. Ticks will crawl to those areas and won’t be able to, or want to, go any further, and they’ll bite there.

Do a tick check on your pets

Once you’ve finished doing a tick check on yourself, it’s also important to perform a tick check on your pet. On a pet, the head region is the most important place to look for ticks. Ticks will also end up on other areas of dogs, or cats. Make sure to check all places where a tick could get caught up in its fur or the crease of its skin.