A mark-release-recapture approach to characterize tick questing preferences and dispersal distance

Studying tick behavior is crucial for understanding how climate, disturbances, and land-use changes shape tick populations and tick-borne disease risk. Mark-release-recapture studies can provide valuable answers to questions regarding tick movement and behavior, population sizes, and survivorship.

Standard tick mark-release-recapture provides limited resolution to understanding individual behaviors, limiting our ability to answer questions that require repeated observations of the same individuals. We developed a new, operationally simple method to track large populations of individual ticks over space and time.

We found non-random movement patterns, including directed movement towards grass, vegetation-dependent dispersal distances and rate, and sex-based differences in movement.

Practical implication: This method can be applied to other tick species to assess tick longevity, determine dispersal ranges and rate, and analyze questing behavior and success.