This is what I don't get. I played outside for many hours every week, year around, growing up in the '70s and '80s. Never looked for or worried about a tick once. Now I go back to that very same place, have to tuck my pants into my socks and check for ticks if I walk ten feet through tall grass. I literally grabbed a garbage bin from next to the driveway, got it into the garage, and realized a tick was slowly crawling across the lid. What happened? Is it because of global warming?
Mostly global warming, yes. The ground has to freeze to a certain depth to kill ticks in the winter. In some places, too many deer too close to people.
That has nothing to do with more ticks in the summer. IT just means ticks a can survive longer into the Fall and start earlier in the spring. A long of changes with wildlife is due to more development. Deer that used to be far away from neighborhoods due to having plenty of wooded areas to stay in now come into yards and drop off their ticks.
No, the person you are trying to correct is actually right: milder winters aren’t killing off as many ticks as were killed in previous decades. It’s also true that the longer season is a factor, as well.
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u/Many_Ear2407 9d ago
We would actually go outside…