Rose Geranium For Ticks

After a blessed three month winter reprieve, our two dogs (Sammy and Cleo) are bringing home deer and dog ticks again. So far, just a few a day, but it will soon get a lot worse. Because the whole family
has suffered from Lyme disease, I have taken finding natural
repellents very seriously.

Here are the easy and effective ways I’ve found for keeping ticks away without resorting to toxic chemicals.

After digging deep in many old herbalist
books I came across mention of Rose Geranium as being an
excellent tick repellent. Palmerosa, a cousin of Rose Geranium,
is also effective. I put just a drop or two—no more—of pure essential oil of rose geranium on each dog’s cloth collar every week, and it really
keeps the ticks away. Check with your vet before using essential oils on cats.

I’d still check the pets daily for ticks. Deer
ticks are the size of poppy seeds and incredibly hard to spot
at the nymph stage so common in the spring. One essential oil
company that offers pure Rose Geranium is Aura Cacia from
Frontier Natural Products. If you’d prefer a ready-made product,
Quantum Herbal products sells a tick and flea
spray for pets with pure Rose Geranium as its main active
ingredient. Both products are available in health food stores.
Note: Pregnant women are advised to avoid essential oils.

Read more: Pets, Natural Remedies, Pests

By Annie B. Bond

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are solely those of the author and may not reflect those of
Care2, Inc., its employees or advertisers.

Mary ann S.

2:44AM PDT on May 18, 2013

Thanks so much for sharing

May 18
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Tanya W.

6:23AM PST on Jan 23, 2013

Sweet!!

January 23
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Carmely G.

4:58PM PDT on Sep 19, 2012

cool

September 19
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Gina R.

7:02AM PST on Mar 7, 2012

I have been using pure Geranium Rose Oil I get from http://www.anandaapothecary.com/aromatherapy-essential-oils/geranium-rose-essential-oil.html. I put a few drops on my dogs collar every few days and she hardly ever has a tick on her anymore! She was getting ticks on a regular basis before I started using it so I am convinced it works! I have read that you have to be careful where you buy it from because much of the geranium that you buy is not not the real oil!

March 7
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Charles G.

5:09AM PDT on Jul 3, 2011

I'd love this to be true but it's a myth about Rose Geranium oil. Not five minutes ago I took five ticks off my dog, put them on a piece of paper and dropped some neat rose geranium oil into the middle of them. The ticks were utterly indifferent to it, some even crawled towards it - it has zero effect of them. I'm getting tired of seeing this 'wisdom' repeated on the internet - it does not work.