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Keeping your community covered. We're committed to producing high-quality, fact-based news and information that gives you the facts in this community we call home. If our work has helped you stay informed, take action, or feel more connected to Windham County – please give now to help us reach our goal of raising $150,000 by December 31st.
In my area of eastern Long Island, we did not have serious problems with deer ticks and Lyme disease for 40 years before deer arrived in the early 1990s and the deer population exploded.
Once the latter occurred, deer ticks and Lyme disease became major issues. Lone star ticks and a variety of other, serious tick-borne diseases have since been added to the mix.
As an experienced professional mammalogist, I know that smaller mammals were abundant from the early 1950s to the early 1990s but unable by themselves to maintain rich tick populations (other than a moderate abundance of dog ticks).
Japanese barberry and honeysuckle may promote tick abundance in some areas; however, the former has never been a significant part of our flora, while honeysuckle tends to be patchy and dispersed in its distribution. In the presence of numerous deer, other vegetation and forest litter seem fully capable of supporting a superabundance of ticks.
