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Ecology and Evolutionary Biology

Seaver College Research And Scholarly Achievement Symposium

Conference

Tick

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Full-Text Articles in Life Sciences

A Tick's Quest: The Effects Of Climatic Stress On Host-Seeking Behavior Of Wild Ticks, Lawson Trimmell, Peter Briggs, Javier Monzón Mar 2024

A Tick's Quest: The Effects Of Climatic Stress On Host-Seeking Behavior Of Wild Ticks, Lawson Trimmell, Peter Briggs, Javier Monzón

Seaver College Research And Scholarly Achievement Symposium

The Lone Star Tick (Amblyomma americanum) is one of the most epidemiologically relevant tick species in the United States and is experiencing a range expansion. Our study aimed to investigate the effects of climatic stress on the behavior and physiology of the Lone Star Tick at the expansion front. We hypothesized that there are differences in survivorship, questing (host-seeking) behavior, and dehydration tolerance based on sex or geographic origin. We also predicted that ticks increase their host-seeking behavior as they approach death due to dehydration stress. We collected adult ticks from six sites across Oklahoma and New York/New Jersey. We …


Checking For Ticks: Analyzing The Efficiency Of Different Tick Collection Methods, Peter Briggs, Lawson Trimmell, Javier Monzón Mar 2024

Checking For Ticks: Analyzing The Efficiency Of Different Tick Collection Methods, Peter Briggs, Lawson Trimmell, Javier Monzón

Seaver College Research And Scholarly Achievement Symposium

Ticks are the most important arthropod disease vectors in both North America and Europe. Field collection of wild ticks is vital for research on the ecology of vector-borne diseases. Dragging and trapping are the two most common methods for collecting wild ticks. Dragging involves a researcher pulling a canvas through a field to collect ticks searching for a host, while trapping exploits ticks’ natural attraction to carbon dioxide to lure them onto a canvas where they get caught on tape. Our study aimed to evaluate which of these two methods is more effective. We chose six sites across three states, …