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Video Q&A ViewAttendees 2

Medical, Urban, and Veterinary Entomology

Section Symposium

Advances, Strategies and Challenges to Tick Control On-Demand Presentations

Evaluation of host-targeted control against the immature stages of Ixodes scapularis at field study sites in Howard County, Maryland

On-Demand
On-Demand
The USDA funded 5-year Areawide Tick IPM Project was implemented at seven field sites in Howard County, Maryland in 2017. The goal of the study is to evaluate efficacy of combined use of three commercially available tick control products/tools in reducing the abundance of the blacklegged tick (Ixodes scapularis) and tick-borne pathogen (TBP) prevalence in ticks and the white-footed mouse, the main vertebrate host of the immature stages of the blacklegged tick. We conducted baseline surveillance of ticks and TBPs at study sites in suburban natural habitats during the first year (2017) of the study. We found 13.6% of questing I. scapularis nymphs to be Borrelia burgdorferi s.l. positive and 1.8% were Anaplasma phagocytophilum positive among all sites. B. burgdorferi s.s. was found in 71.1% of I. scapularis nymphs removed from mice and 58.8% of captured mice. Two host-targeted tick control products, ‘4-Poster’ deer bait and treatment station and SELECT Tick Control System (TCS) bait boxes, and the Met52 biopesticide were deployed in different combinations starting in 2018. Treatments continued in 2019 and 2020. This presentation will report the results of this multi-year study. Specifically, efficacy of tick control in terms of tick load on mice and tick-borne pathogen prevalence in questing ticks and white-footed mice will be reported. The factors affecting tick control efficacy in the suburban environment of Maryland will be discussed.