The Register Citizen (Torrington, CT)
Exotic new tick found in state
WCSU researchers confirm presence of invasive Asian species
DANBURY — Researchers at Western Connecticut State University have confirmed the first instance of an exotic new tick in Connecticut.
The Asian long-horned tick is an invasive species that can harm livestock but is not yet known to be a danger to humans in the United States.
The WCSU Tickborne Disease Prevention Laboratory collected the tick in early July and testing confirmed the single specimen is the new species. Research assistant Brittany Schappach, who completed her undergraduate biology degree in May, caught the tick using a cloth “drag” at one of the team’s monitoring sites in Fairfield County. It was aggressive and quickly moved around the cloth, unlike most of the ticks the team picks up.
“Right away when I was counting the ticks, I could tell this one was different,” she said. “The size, shape and color were all different from the
black-legged ticks that we usually collect.”
The long-horned tick — also called the cattle tick or bush tick — was recently confirmed across the state line in Westchester County, N.Y., and feared to be spreading further into the Northeast where it could threaten more animals.
State entomologists suspected this summer that the tick may be present in Connecticut, but it wasn’t until the specimen Schappach picked up during the lab’s weekly monitoring that it was officially confirmed. Schappach and fellow research assistants Sandra Zapata-Ramirez and Daniel Buser studied the tick before sending it off for DNA analysis at the Center for Vector Biology at Rutgers University and the National Veterinary Services Laboratory in Iowa.
“This particular tick looks very similar to rabbit ticks that we have collected in the past,” said Neeta Connally, a WCSU biology professor and director of the tick lab on campus. “But rabbit ticks do not really threaten livestock health the way that this invasive tick species can, so it was important to confirm for sure what kind of tick we had on our hands.”
The single tick found by Schappach remains the only specimen of its kind in the state, but the tick has been found in Arkansas, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia.
Scientists believe the long-horned tick — native to east Asia — first arrived in the U.S. in 2010, although they are not sure where or how.
The tick is able to feed on the blood of many types of animals, including mammals and birds, and can spread unusually fast because of its ability to reproduce without mating, according to WCSU scientists.
For now, the tick is more threatening to animals, which can be killed if a large number of ticks attach and drain too much blood from their bodies, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. It is capable of transmitting diseases to humans, as it has in China, but so far has not in the U.S. It is not yet known whether the tick will be able to transmit diseases that are already here, such as Lyme, Connally said.
Prevention will be key, just as with any other tick: Performing daily checks, showering after coming indoors, wearing repellent and long pants, she said. “The real threat right now is to livestock,” she said. “In terms of human health, at this point, nobody knows.”