Deer Ticks

What is a tick?

Ticks are not insects but Arachnids, a class of Arthropods, which also includes mites, spiders and scorpions. They are divided into two groups - hard bodied and soft bodied - both of which are capable of transmitting diseases in the United States.

Ticks are parasites that feed by latching on to an animal host, imbedding their mouthparts into the host's skin and sucking its blood. This method of feeding makes ticks the perfect vectors (organisms that harbor and transmit disease) for a variety of pathogenic agents. Ticks are responsible for at least 9 different known diseases in humans in the U.S., including Lyme disease, Rocky Mountain spotted fever, babesiosis, and more recently, ehrlichiosis.

The Deer Tick Life Cycle

The deer (or black-legged) tick in the East and the related western black-legged tick are the primary (and possibly the only) known transmitters of true Lyme disease in the United States. Both are hard-bodied ticks with a two-year life cycle. Like all species of ticks, deer ticks and their relatives require a blood meal to progress to each successive stage in their life cycles.

The life cycle of the deer tick comprises three growth stages after the eggs are laid: the larva, nymph and adult. In both the northeastern and mid-western U.S., where Lyme disease has become prevalent, it takes about two years for the tick to hatch from the egg, go through all three stages, reproduce, and then die. A detailed description of this life cycle and the seasonal timing of peak activity, as they occur in these regions, is provided below.