With the Summer season in full swing and many people now spending more time outside, nature lovers must be aware of ticks and how to prevent an encounter.

Ticks are an external parasite that comes in a variety of species including some of which that serve as vectors for bacterial infections such as Lyme disease.

The American Dog or Wood tick as it is more commonly known is frequently found in Saskatchewan and like all ticks, it makes its presence known by biting as Sarah Ludlow Conservation Science Coordinator with the Saskatchewan region of the Nature Conservancy of Canada explains.

"If you have a tick actually bite you, you will have irritation at the site. So there will be some local skin irritation and inflammation that will happen just from the bite itself and then some ticks are vectors for different bacterial infections, so certain species will carry different types of diseases."

A tick must actually be on your skin to bite you and so if one is found on your clothes or before it bites, it can simply be picked off and flicked away.

There are a number of methods to prevent being bitten as Ludlow explains

"Tuck your pants into your socks, tuck your shirt into your pants, wear long sleeves. Just minimize the access they have to your actual skin, that way if you are walking out in the grass or in the bush and you can see them crawling on you, you can just pick them off before they get under your clothes."

Additional prevention methods include wearing light coloured clothing so ticks are easier to spot and putting on bug spray.

Should a person obtain a tick bite, Ludlow advises that the best removal method is to use a pair of tweezers in order to pull the head and mouth straight out without twisting as this could potentially release bacteria from inside the tick.

The wood tick itself does not cause Lyme disease and tick season generally runs from the month of June through to October.