Tick infestation

When the vet came to see my two abandoned puppies he found they had the worst infestation of ticks he had ever seen, and of course Frontlined them. The ticks are dropping off them, though there are still a lot there. He told me that this year Sarajevo has a real plague of ticks, due to the warm wet weather this spring. The cats are all Frontlined regularly, but I gave them a slightly early dose yesterday just to be sure. But I have discovered that what I thought was a small scab on Napoleon's head is a tick, and despite being 24 hours since the new Frontline application it is still alive tonight and has swelled. I don't know what to do - why is the Frontline not working, and how and when do I remove it by some other method?

Well, first don't do any of the old wive's tales ways of getting them off, like burning them or rubbing vaseline on them. You do not want a tick that is still attached to release the chemicals they release in death throes into your cat.
How long ago was the frontline applied? It takes awhile to work its way through the coat. Try brushing everyone if its been at least 24 hours and lots of petting to help work the medicine through the coat.

No, I wasn't about to burn it off! It has been 24 hours since the Frontline, which is why I thought it should be dead by now.

That's strange that the Frontline hasn't killed it yet!!

I don't have any experience with ticks, but I believe that you can tweeze them out?! I don't know when you can do this though!

I found some information on the Provet site (I don't think this link takes you straight there, so you'll have to search for 'ticks')

I hope you can get the tick out soon!

Some friends came round for coffee and I asked one of them to hold him while I took it out with the tweezers, and lo and behold, it had gone! So I guess the Frontline worked in the end, though it took much longer (36 hours) than I would have expected. The puppies were also done the same day and they are still covered in the little horrors, so I will wait awhile before taking any further action with them. I don't want to scare them more than necessary.