Source: The Gazette
5/22/2009
By Cindy Hadish

Myth: Ticks drop out of trees and into your hair while you’re walking in the woods.

Not true, said Jon Oliver, a graduate research assistant in the medical entomology lab at Iowa State University.

It might be more palatable to think ticks are jumping out of trees than the reality — that they crawl up your body and into your hair, said Oliver, who identifies ticks for ISU’s Lyme Disease Surveillance Program.

Regardless of how they move, Oliver said it’s important to check for ticks while camping this Memorial Day weekend, or whenever Iowans are in forested areas.

“All ticks are capable of carrying diseases,” he said.

Most predominant in Iowa is Lyme disease, carried by blacklegged ticks — commonly called deer ticks — which can cause flu-like symptoms such as fatigue, headache, fever and chills. Treatment involves antibiotics.

Some patients suffer from more serious symptoms even years later, including sensitivity to light, blurred vision, memory loss, loss of balance or paralysis.

Oliver said while it’s possible for deer ticks to live in grassy areas, most are in forests.

For example, Allamakee, Clayton and Winneshiek counties in northeast Iowa have long-established problems with deer ticks, he said.

In its immature stage, those ticks rely on the white-footed mouse as host.

“Where there’s forests, there’s this mouse; where there’s this mouse, you’re most likely going to find deer ticks or blacklegged ticks,” Oliver said. “But you can get Lyme disease potentially in any county that has deer ticks.”

Campers and hikers can use the same mosquito repellent with DEET to repel ticks, he noted.

Other tips include wearing light-colored clothing so crawling ticks can be seen more easily and wearing long-sleeved shirts, long pants and tucking pants into socks.

Ticks should be removed with tweezers.

Oliver said the ticks could be discarded, stepped on or flushed, but he prefers that Iowans send them to ISU’s surveillance program.

As of May 12th, 33 blacklegged or deer ticks, had been submitted to the lab. ISU also conducts mosquito surveillance, but Oliver said the first mosquitoes were just submitted today.

Last year, about 18 percent of susceptible ticks tested positive for the bacteria that causes Lyme disease and 109 human cases of Lyme disease were reported to the Iowa Department of Public Health.

Information on how to send ticks to ISU and more about the program can be found at: www.ent.iastate.edu/medent