If you’re hiking in woodland below 1200m, there’s a slight risk of receiving attention from ticks. These can occasionally carry nasty diseases such as encephalitis, so they’re worth avoiding – proper hiking boots and socks significantly cut down your chances of a bite. The medically favoured way of extracting them, contrary to tales of dabbing them with alcohol or heating them with a match-flame, is to pull them out carefully with small tweezers. Switzerland also has a couple of species of non-fatal snakes, but to find them you’ll have to creep stealthily: they’re frightened of humans.