The Missouri Department of Conservation and A.T. Still University have partnered to determine locations of tick species, and the pathogens they may harbor, across Missouri. We need your help. We are asking the citizens of Missouri to send us ticks so we can identify and test them for bacterial pathogens.
Problem
There is a pressing need to increase tick surveillance in Missouri. The state has a diverse and abundant tick community that is poorly understood, and new human pathogens transmitted by the ticks are being discovered. There are many tick-borne human pathogens in the state of Missouri and yet there is no comprehensive map of where tick species occur, or of the human pathogens those ticks are carrying.
Approach
Citizen science is when members of the public collaborate with scientists to collect data and samples and become active participants in scientific study. Citizen science has been demonstrated as an effective technique to accomplish data collection and disease ecology surveillance at a scale unattainable by scientists alone. We will need the help of many citizen scientists to map the distributions of ticks in a place the size of Missouri.
Project duration and schedule
We will begin the study in April 2021 and conclude in September 2022. Distribution maps on the website will be updated on a weekly basis as ticks are being submitted so that the citizens of Missouri can actively follow the progress of the study.
We would like to acknowledge Dr. Nathan Nieto and the Bay Area Lyme Foundation for serving as a template for this current study.
Please understand that this is a research study and not a diagnostic service intended for use in making clinical decisions.
Ask a question
Can I get the results from my ticks’ pathogen screen?
No. We currently don’t have the personnel necessary to reply to all contributors. Please remember that these testing services can’t be used for clinical or diagnostic decisions. It will take us a while to process the samples and obtain the results.
What types of ticks do you want?
We desire all species of ticks as long as they are collected in Missouri. They can be found in your yard, the woods, on an animal, or on you. Ideal participants in this study are individuals that spend a significant amount of time outdoors during work or recreation that encounter large numbers of ticks through their activities. The accuracy of our study improves as we receive more ticks from a given area.
Can I send you ticks that are dead?
Living/viable ticks are preferred, but yes we can screen dead ticks if they survive shipping without disintegrating.
Can I place more than one tick in a bag?
Yes. Ticks that have a common history (e.g., collected from the same animal, collected during the same hike/event, collected from the same county, etc.) can be combined in a single bag.
Can I submit ticks that have either fed on or were attached to an animal or human?
Yes, but please indicate this clearly on the form. Ticks that have previously fed on humans must be handled more carefully in the lab due to exposure to human blood products.
Can I send ticks off my animal if it has been treated with flea/tick control product?
Yes, but please include this information on the submission form.
Can I submit ticks that are stuck to tape or a lint roller?
This is not preferred, but we can work with ticks stuck to some types of tape/adhesive paper. When the ticks are stuck to an adhesive material, they are difficult to remove and it takes much longer to collect and sort them. If a tick is compromised during extrication comes apart while removing from the tape, it can’t be accurately identified and must be discarded. In addition, ticks immobilized on adhesive have a shorter survival time. If you have to use tape, painters’ masking tape is best because it has lower adhesive properties. Don’t use duct tape. Ticks can rarely be removed from duct tape intact.
How long will you accept ticks?
We will continue to accept ticks through summer 2022.
- Download, print, and fill out a submission form and address an envelope to:
- A.T. Still University
Deb Hudman, Senior Research Associate
Dept. of Microbiology & Immunology
800 W. Jefferson St.
Kirksville, MO 63501
- A.T. Still University
- Place each tick sample into a plastic zip top bag with a piece of damp paper towel or cotton ball. Note, the size of the zip top bag may vary AND the paper towel or cotton ball does not need to be dripping wet, just moist.
- Fold the bag containing the tick sample and place inside another plastic zip top bag with the completed sample submission form.
- Place this bag into the addressed envelope and mail. Note, one stamp should be sufficient postage.
Ticks that have a common history (e.g., collected from the same animal, collected during the same hike/event, collected from the same county and date, etc.) can be combined in a single bag.
Disclaimer:
By sending you this tick, I release the A.T. Still University, the Department of Microbiology & Immunology, and their staff and employees of any liability with regards to the outcome of testing or any findings in perpetuity. The laboratory of Deb Hudman at the A.T. Still University will identify and test the tick(s) I submit for the presence of DNA associated with disease-causing pathogens. These tests are not intended to provide clinical diagnosis of disease and they should not be interpreted as a substitute for clinical testing or consultation with a physician.
Results from my submissions will be used to determine the presence of tick species and their pathogens by county for the state of Missouri. Accordingly, this information will be shared with the public and health agencies that may request it. The shared data is completely anonymous.
13 December, 2021
As promised, here are some images of the deer ked. I have now received ten of these from four different counties (Bollinger, Hickory, Ozark, and Webster).
22 November, 2021
19 November, 2021
We have received several submissions that were not ticks. There have been weevils, stink bugs, hog louse, and spiders. However, this week, we received something that might be of interest, a Neotropical deer ked (Lipoptena mazamae). There were four of these creatures submitted off of a harvested deer along with blacklegged ticks. The deer ked is an introduced biting fly that found its way to North America back in 1907. It is a blood-sucking parasitic fly native to Europe and most likely made its way here from a shipment of live animals.
This fly has a unique life cycle. It mates on a host, and a single egg hatches and grows inside the female’s body. The adult female feeds the larvae until it is fully grown, then she will birth a mature larva which will begin to pupate. The larva drops to the ground and hardens to form a dark protective covering of what is then called a puparium. The female, after birthing, will again feed, mate, and produce another larva. She will continue to rear larvae in this fashion for up to ten months. Winged adults emerge from the puparium in early Fall to early Winter and look for a host. Once they find a host, they burrow through the fur shedding its wings by breaking them off close to their bases, and remain on the host for the rest of their life, repeatedly taking bites and feeding on blood. These blood meals are short in duration, and they can engorge in 15 to 25 minutes.
At first glance, these wingless keds can appear quite similar to ticks, but they will move faster than ticks, and being an insect, they will have six legs instead of eight. There is one previously documented identification of a deer ked in St. Clair County, Missouri, and this collection was from Webster County.
They will occasionally bite humans, and there is recent evidence that they carry nearly half a dozen human pathogens. It is unknown whether they can transmit these pathogens to humans or to whatever host they are on, which is most often deer, elk, and moose. It has been documented that this species of deer ked can carry Bartonella. Bartonella is a bacteria that can cause a febrile illness and fatality in humans and animals. Known vectors of Bartonella include fleas and lice. In a study on a deer farm in Alabama, researchers detected four Bartonella species in the deer herd and three Bartonella species in their keds. In separate research, it has also been shown that Bartonella is vertically transmitted between ked generations, which suggests that this deer ked may be a competent vector.
I will take some images and provide them here at a later date.
08 November, 2021
A new species of tick was submitted last week to this research project! It is Dermacentor albipictus, the winter tick. We have received this tick from three counties, Jefferson, Reynolds, and St. Clair. All specimens were collected from harvested white-tailed deer. Although typically, these ticks are highly patterned, all submitted so far are the unpatterned version (see image, middle photo).
The winter tick is a one-host tick, with all three active life stages (larvae, nymphs, and adults) feeding on the same individual. They produce one generation in less than a year. The ticks will feed and remain on their host during their subsequent molts until spring, when adult females detach and drop to the ground. Their preferred hosts are moose and other ungulates, including deer, elk, caribou, and occasionally horses and cattle. Winter ticks rarely bite and feed on humans.
07 October, 2021
We are using new primers to confirm if the samples testing positive for Ehrlichia are indeed Ehrlichia or if they are Coxiella endosymbionts. It took some time to research the primers, order them, test them with a new Ehrlichia control, and optimize the PCR procedure. Yesterday we completed running 31 samples that had previously tested positive for Ehrlichia, and two remain positive. Both positives were from Pulaski County. We will need to attain some more primers and test the others for Coxiella. Once all of the samples have been completed, we will list all positives by county on this website. This new data is excellent news! We were nearing a 50% positivity rate for Ehrlichia in all tested ticks, which would be terrifying. Using these new primers will drop the positivity rate tremendously and, most importantly, be accurate. Thank you so much for being patient as we work this out.
09 September, 2021
We received results from sequencing data from the Borrelia species we detected in Lincoln county, and it came back as Borrelia lonestari. Borrelia lonestari has been implicated as causing Southern Tick Associated Rash Illness (STARI) but has never been definitively confirmed. All of the positive Rickettsia samples that we sent for sequencing were positive for Rickettsia amblyommatis as expected. It is debated whether R. amblyommatis is a human pathogen, but it is documented that humans will develop a robust immune response to this organism and may complicate the diagnosis of Rocky Mountain spotted fever (Rickettsia rickettsii) using serological assays.
Of important note, we have had so many positive samples for ehrlichiosis that it makes us nervous. As a result, we sent off multiple samples for sequencing, and some came back as positive for Coxiella endosymbionts. This is a bacteria related to Coxiella burnetii, the agent of Q fever, which has been observed previously within cells of A. americanum and is not a human pathogen. As a result, we will need to go through all of the previous positives for Ehrlichia species, run more PCR’s including some specifically for C. burnetii, and send more samples off for sequencing for verification. This process will take some time, but we want to make sure that we get it right. We apologize for any confusion this may cause and the delay in reporting results.
01 September, 2021
Lone star ticks (Amblyomma americanum):
St. Clair County 10 tested, 8 positive for ehrlichiosis
Stone County 10 tested, 6 positive for ehrlichiosis
We also had positives for Rickettsia species but none of the positives were the bug that causes Rocky Mountain spotted fever.
27 August, 2021
Lone Star ticks (Amblyomma americanum)
Macon County 10 tested, 8 positive for ehrlichiosis
Platte County 10 tested, 6 positive for ehrlichiosis
We also had positives for Rickettsia species but none of the positives were the bug that causes Rocky Mountain spotted fever.
To date, we have tested 220 adult lone star ticks from 23 counties and 94 of those were positive for ehrlichiosis. That is a 42% infection rate!
We are in the process of testing St. Clair and Stone counties and next on the list will be Pulaski and St. Francois counties. Stay tuned…
Today is Nate’s last day in the tick lab and he will be missed. We wish Nate the best of luck in his future endeavors.
18 August, 2021
Lone Star ticks (Amblyomma americanum)
Cass County 7 tested, 3 positive for ehrlichiosis
Jackson County 10 tested, 6 positive for ehrlichiosis
Taney County 10 tested, 4 positive for ehrlichiosis
Shannon County 10 tested, 5 positive for ehrlichiosis
11 August, 2021
Lone star ticks (Amblyomma americanum):
Texas County 9 tested, 7 positive for ehrlichiosis
Howell County 10 tested, 7 positive for ehrlichiosis
We also had positives for Rickettsia species but none of the positives were the bug that causes Rocky Mountain spotted fever.
6 August, 2021
Lone star ticks (Amblyomma americanum):
Christian County 10 tested, 4 positive for ehrlichiosis
Cole County 10 tested, 4 positive for ehrlichiosis
Greene County 9 tested, 1 positive for ehrlichiosis
Lincoln County 10 tested, 3 positive for ehrlichiosis and 1 positive for Borrelia spp. (we need to run more PCR’s to determine if STARI or Lyme disease)
We also had positives for Rickettsia species but none of the positives were the bug that causes Rocky Mountain spotted fever.
Next week we will be testing Cass, Howell, Jackson, and Texas counties.
4 August, 2021
We want to give thanks to some of our unsung heroes. Maybe it’s just us but we find these hilarious or at least Deb does!
August 3, 2021
Here is how we are testing each county. We choose ten adult ticks of one species. We selected ten ticks that provide a wide distribution within the county. For example, here is a Google map of Franklin County. The location of each balloon represents one adult lone star tick submitted to us. We isolated the DNA from those ten ticks and performed separate PCR reactions for four different bacterial species. In some cases, we report eight or nine ticks for an individual county. That is because we did not attain enough DNA to move forward for all of the PCR reactions. We will go back to those counties and test more ticks to bring it up to a minimum of ten adults per species.
30 July, 2021
Just as a reminder we are testing for Borrelia (Lyme & STARI), Ehrlichia (ehrlichiosis), Francisella (tularemia), and Rickettsia (Rocky Mountain spotted fever) species.
Lone star ticks (Amblyomma americanum):
Camden County 10 tested, no pathogens detected
Phelps County 10 tested, no pathogens detected
Montgomery County 10 tested, no pathogens detected
St. Louis County 9 tested, 5 positive for ehrlichiosis
We also had positives for Rickettsia species but none of the positives were the bug that causes Rocky Mountain spotted fever.
Next week we will be testing Christian and Cole Counties.
26 July, 2021
We will eventually have the pathogen data linked to the map but until we can get all of the kinks worked out, we will start reporting some of the data here.
Lone star ticks (Amblyomma americanum):
Adair County 9 tested, 4 positive for ehrlichiosis
Boone County 10 tested, 3 positive for ehrlichiosis
Callaway County 10 tested, 7 positive for ehrlichiosis
Jefferson County 10 tested, 4 positive for ehrlichiosis
Franklin County 9 tested, 8 positive for ehrlichiosis (Holy Smokes!)
St. Charles County 8 tested, 1 positive for ehrlichiosis
Warren County 10 tested, 4 positive for ehrlichiosis
We also had positives for Rickettsia species but none of the positives were the bug that causes Rocky Mountain spotted fever.
We are currently testing Montgomery and St. Louis Counties this week.
2 July, 2021
We have surpassed 10,000 ticks being submitted to this research project! Thank you so much. For those of you around the Portland Missouri area I will be giving a talk along with others on Saturday September 11th. Please check out the flyer and come join us with your questions. Hope to see you there.
24 June, 2021
We had a very exciting submission from St. Louis City, our first soft tick. We believe it is a bat tick but as we are not experienced in identifying soft ticks so we have sent off some images to the U.S. National Tick Collection in hopes of confirming our identification. As you will see from the images, soft ticks are very different in appearance from hard ticks. When looking at the dorsal side (back of tick) it appears there are no feeding parts or what people typically call the head of the tick. From the ventral side (belly of tick) you can see the mouth parts. Soft ticks do not have a scutum or a “shield” like the hard ticks that is why they appear wrinkly and dimpled. Soft ticks tend to hang out in animal nests, burrows, or roosts and do not quest like hard ticks. Soft ticks will occasionally bite humans and pet animals when their primary hosts are unavailable.
Most ticks people encounter are hard ticks. For instance, we have received over 9,800 ticks so far and only one has been a soft tick!
22 June, 2021
Don’t become prey to ticks, instead, become a tick predator! Nymphs (seed ticks) are out in full swing. Please look for ticks after spending time outside. If you find one, keep looking, there will be two more.
9 June, 2021
We want to give thanks to some of our unsung heroes. We appreciate the drawings, stories, and puns that are submitted along with the ticks. We are posting a few to share. It always puts a smile on our faces. In addition, we want to thank the Daughters of the American Revolution Montgomery Chapter for selecting this research as their Conservation project.
2 June, 2021
As of the 2nd of June, we have received more than 7,500 ticks!!!
The tick lab has hired a new staff member, Nate Linker, to provide additional help this summer. We are hoping this will free up time to begin the pathogen testing.
We have received five species of tick from around the state with the lone star tick being the most prevalent. In fact, we have received the lone star tick in all but four counties (Atchison, Carroll, Mississippi, and New Madrid). The American dog tick is the second most received tick species. We have received the American dog tick in all but thirteen counties. We have also received the blacklegged tick (deer tick), Gulf coast tick, and the rabbit tick.
20 May, 2021
To date, we have received more than 6,300 ticks!!! We have received at least one tick from every county except for New Madrid. If you know of anyone in New Madrid, please let them know about this project.
We will identify and count all species received but will only be testing a subset of those for human pathogens dependent upon the number of samples received for each county. We will be testing for Borrelia spp. (think Lyme and STARI), Ehrlichia spp. (ehrlichiosis) Francisella spp. (tularemia), and Rickettsia spp. (Rocky Mountain spotted fever). We want to make sure that we test a subset of all species from every county that we receive, so the testing will take some time.
If you are interested in what ticks have been submitted by county, please go to the tab called “maps”. You can click on that tab and you should see the state of MO. At that point, you can click on the county of interest, and it will report how many ticks we have found and what species. This map gets updated on a weekly basis. Once we begin pathogen testing that data will also be available in the map tab.
The easiest way we have found to view the data from the map tab is at the bottom center of the map box there is a small arrow pointing up. If you click on that, it will show the information in a spreadsheet format instead of a list. You can then either scan down to find your county or click on the county in the map itself.
Thank you, Missourians. Your efforts and contributions are most appreciated!