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<p>Any hope that the arctic blast from this month&#8217;s snowstorm would knock back the tick population for the rest of the year likely won&#8217;t come to fruition.</p><p>Dr. Jane Huffman, biology professor at East Stroudsburg University and director of the Northeast Wildlife DNA Laboratory, said ticks aren&#8217;t impacted by snow.</p><p>&#8220;Lack of snow dehydrates ticks and they die. But the snow is like a blanket for them,&#8221; Huffman said. &#8220;They get underneath the leaf litter and become dormant. Ticks do quite well in the snow.&#8221;</p><p>Eric Huck, co-founder of the PA Lyme Resource Network, was more blunt with his prediction for the tick population this year.</p><p>&#8220;The early expectation is this is going to be a rough year,&#8221; Huck said. &#8220;The warm winter didn&#8217;t kill them off. People are already seeing them.&#8221;</p><p>With the start of trout season just weeks away and the opening day of gobbler season following at the end of April, not too mention warmer temperatures attracting more people outdoors, questions about tick numbers for the spring and summer months are common.</p><p>While Huffman said it&#8217;s hard to predict, she did say with certainty that ticks are here and they are likely to stay.</p><p>&#8220;We&#8217;re going to have to live with them. We&#8217;re not going to eliminate the deer and mice,&#8221; Huffman said, referring to two of the more prevalent carriers of ticks.</p><p>Ticks weren&#8217;t always this common.</p><p>Huffman said she first studied ticks in the lab in 1995, and back then, she had a hard time finding them. But as deer numbers increased so did ticks thanks to the abundant food source, Huffman said.</p><p>Increasing bear numbers also played a role, but perhaps the biggest factor when it comes to tick populations is the mast crop.</p><p>An abundant mast crop increases the mouse density in the woods. Mice are a primary carrier of ticks, so the two populations are sometimes dependent on one another.</p><p>Conversely, turkey and opossums are two of the best consumers of ticks.</p><p>&#8220;They&#8217;re like vacuum cleaners for ticks,&#8221; Huffman said. &#8220;They clean up the woods.&#8221;</p><p>Huck, who has had Lyme disease since 2009, said a number of factors have fallen into place to allow ticks to increase and become established in Pennsylvania. He agreed that an abundant mast crop is beneficial to mice, particularly the white-footed mouse, which is a primary host for ticks. He also said the suburban sprawl has fragmented wooded areas, limiting the efficiency and number of predators in those areas, such as red fox, that prey on mice.</p><p>&#8220;These broken tracts support the white-footed mouse, but not predators, which is why the mice population has exploded, along with ticks,&#8221; Huck said. &#8220;When you take into account the fragmented woodland, higher numbers of mice and deer and the fact that Pennsylvania is having rather mild winters, and the tick population is through the roof.&#8221;</p><p>Generally, ticks aren&#8217;t active until the air temperature reaches into the 40s, Huffman said. But this winter mild temperatures kept the insects active virtually year round.</p><p>And their presence presents a problem.</p><p>While Huffman said more work needs to be done to determine the percentage of ticks that actually are infected and capable of transmitting Lyme disease, preventative measures aren&#8217;t always 100 percent effective.</p><p>While there are medications for dogs and cats to protect them from ticks, they can still carry the insects into a house. While the ticks won&#8217;t feast on the protected pet, they will hop on the nearest person for an easy meal.</p><p>&#8220;Usually people acquire Lyme disease not from adult ticks but from nymphs because they&#8217;re small and harder to see,&#8221; Huffman said. &#8220;A good rule of thumb is a tick has to be on you for 18 to 24 hours in order to transmit the disease.&#8221;</p><p>At the Northeast Wildlife DNA Laboratory, Huffman and her staff are able to test ticks to see if they carry the bacteria that causes Lyme disease. Extracting DNA from an individual tick which can reveal specific pathogens, and it takes two to three days for a result.</p><p>Anyone can submit a tick, dead or alive, for testing, the cost is $50.</p><p>Huffman recalled when a woman came to the lab with a tick that she found on her young son&#8217;s bed. The tick was swollen and engorged with blood, and the mother feared that the insect had been on her son.</p><p>&#8220;We were able to take the blood from the tick and determine it was animal blood,&#8221; Huffman said. &#8220;The tick was on the family dog, which was on the bed.&#8221;</p><p>Huck said Pennsylvania has led the nation for diagnosed cases of Lyme disease from 2010-2015. He expects the state to rank at the top again for 2016, and, according to the Center for Disease Control, there were more than 7,000 confirmed Lyme disease cases in 2015.</p><p>But that number is likely on the low side.</p><p>&#8220;The CDC has said you should multiply that number by 10 to get an accurate reflection of real cases, because many aren&#8217;t diagnosed,&#8221; Huck said. &#8220;It&#8217;s basically a pandemic.&#8221;</p><p><ins>For other sports stories, <a href="https://www.timesleader.com/category/sports" target="_blank">click here</a>.</ins></p><style>
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<div class="neCaption">Despite the recent snowstorm, mild temperatures for much of the winter mean tick numbers will likely be high this spring and summer. </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo0>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/web1_tick.jpeg</photo0><caption0>Despite the recent snowstorm, mild temperatures for much of the winter mean tick numbers will likely be high this spring and summer. </caption0><photoCredit0>Photo courtesy of East Stroudsburg University </photoCredit0></div><div class="neFile"><img class="neImage" src="https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/web1_tick1.jpg">
<div class="neCaption"></div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo1>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/web1_tick1.jpg</photo1><caption1></caption1><photoCredit1>Photo courtesy of East Stroudsburg University </photoCredit1></div></div>
<div class="metaInfo"><subheadMeta>Experts expecting boom in warmer months</subheadMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><bylineMeta><p>By Tom Venesky</p><p>tvenesky@www.timesleader.com</p></bylineMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><factboxMeta><p><strong>Protecting yourself from ticks</strong></p><p>While ticks are likely to remain a burdensome part of Pennsylvania&#8217;s outdoors, Eric Huck of the PA Lyme Resource Network said education and prevention can make for a safe experience outside. Ticks don&#8217;t jump, he said, and they attach to a host by sitting in tall grass or brush and waiting for something to walk by that they can attach to.</p><p>Huck said 70 percent of the protection area is from the knees down, and while chemical sprays work he prefers to use cedar oil.</p><p>&#8220;I use it and it repels and kills ticks,&#8221; Huck said. &#8220;You do have to reapply it more often, but it works and is less harsh than chemicals.&#8221;</p><p>Huck also recommends getting into the routine of conducting checks for ticks after spending time outside. Focus on the armpits, behind the knees, groin area and hair when searching for ticks, he said.</p><p>&#8220;We have to figure out how to co-exist with ticks, and heightened vigilance is the key,&#8221; Huck said.</p><p>The PA Lyme Resource Network also lists numerous Lyme support groups across the state. To contact the local support group in Luzerne County, email nepalyme@palyme.org.</p><p>For more information on tick prevention and Lyme disease, visit palyme.org.</p></factboxMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><shirttailMeta><p>Reach Tom Venesky at 570-991-6395 or on Twitter @TomVenesky</p></shirttailMeta></div>

Experts weigh-in on winter’s impact on tick populations