Where I’m from, you can’t be considered a responsible outdoor person unless you’re willing to inspect your father’s naked body for ticks. Nova Scotia, on the east coast of Canada, has the dubious honour of being among the tick-iest places in the world. Surely these things are hard to measure, but reputable scientists claim it has the highest tick-to-person ratio in the country, and, at about one case of Lyme disease for every 1,000 residents per year, the highest incidence of Lyme disease as well. Walking outside on anything besides cut grass or concrete is likely to yield multiple tiny, near-indestructible arachnids that immediately make an upward dash for a warm crevice at the knee, armpit or often, groin, to burrow into. Finding and removing them can require a mirror and some contortions, or a helpful and unsqueamish friend or family member.
Things are – thankfully – not quite so bad in the UK. But the recent outbreak of potentially deadly tick-borne encephalitis virus (TBEV) in England and Scotland is a reminder that ticks are getting worse here, as well. The first suspected incidence of the disease in the UK was in 2019, and cases of Lyme disease also appear to be increasing over the past few years.
Studies have shown several tick species in Europe becoming more numerous, and moving further north. And in the UK, Public Health England’s Tick Surveillance Scheme has found ticks expanding their range across the UK. Rewilding by expanding tree and brush cover, and introducing more deer and other wild animals, can increase the tick population. But a huge driver of the recent exponential expansion of ticks into the northern hemisphere is climate change.
Ticks thrive in the drudgery of in-between seasons. The not too hot, not too cold, pervasively wet transitions between winter and summer are the preferred climate of the tick. As winter breaks earlier, and summer lingers into autumn, and northern regions see warmer years overall, ticks emerge earlier, breed more, range north – and generally make a nuisance of themselves. This connection between warming and the recent tick explosion is made explicit by studies and government reports in North America. In the UK, scientists have warned that climate change here may have a similar effect. The current tick apocalypse in North America may be the tick future on these shores, around which time my parents’ home in Nova Scotia will presumably be fully overrun.
There are things you can do to avoid deadly tick-borne diseases. Avoid high grass and brush; tuck your trousers into your socks; and spray repellent on your clothing below the knees. There is a partial tech-fix in the works in the form of a Lyme disease vaccine. And when ticks are found and removed quickly, the chance of catching anything from them is very low. You should get comfortable peering at your own hard-to-see regions, or help your companions to find parasites by grooming like great apes. With the correct preparation and aftercare, just wandering through a tick-infested area is unlikely to be dangerous.
But that doesn’t mean it isn’t annoying. Ticks are unpleasant; billions more ticks are extremely unpleasant. People will make a convincing argument for the inherent value of even the most seemingly useless and irritating life forms, but the case for ticks is slim. They don’t plant seeds or disperse pollen, they don’t eat any other annoying animals and they barely factor in the overall food web. The nicest thing I can say about ticks is that I respect their resilience. They’re nearly impossible to kill, surviving squishing, drowning and being doused in most repellants. The preferred method at home is to put a flame to them with a lighter or match, after which they emit a – grimly – satisfying pop as their carapace explodes. We really hate ticks.
More ticks won’t cause the downfall of human civilisation. But they are an exemplar of one of the less appreciated aspects of our changing world. We tend to focus on potential apocalyptic scenarios and the vast material damage that will come with the climate crisis. Shattered ecosystems, mass extinctions of animals and plants – a poorer, more difficult world. But perturbing nature in the way we are doing doesn’t always – or just – have biblical consequences. Sometimes the way nature adapts just makes the world slightly worse and more irritating.
Just as many of the species that we subjectively judge to be most beautiful will be the first to become extinct as the world warms, this little disease-ridden bug that nobody likes will inherit the northern hemisphere. Good reasons to address climate breakdown are manifold already, but heading off a perpetual tick season is another small, good one.
Stephen Buranyi is a writer specialising in science and the environment
