Ticks are arachnids and therefore closely related to spiders and distant cousins of scorpions. Britain has many different species each preferring to feed on the blood of a different animal. Sheep ticks are the ones most likely to bite humans but hedgehog, fox and badger ticks will as well. Although the UK tick cannot survive in your home and reproduce, the brown dog tick, which has arrived from Europe can. Ticks wait on tall grasses, bushes and trees for a host to brush past. It then climbs aboard and moves to somewhere warm and dark before starting to feed. Some ticks carry and transmit a whole range of diseases picked up from its hosts which are dangerous to both you and your pet. Lyme disease in humans is one of them.
