Lyme Disease Case Study

When and where was lymes first reported?

1975

Lyme, Connecticut

How is lymes transmitted?

Tick

Which tick stage of life presents the highest threat to human transmittance?

Nymph

Each stage of a tick’s life has how many hosts?

One (one blood meal)

True or False: lymes is passed from mother to offspring

False

Goal of case study

Determine how fluctuating mouse populations impact prey dynamics and parasite dynamics

Result of case study

Years with larger acorn mast leads to increased mouse populations

Larger acorn mast also leads to deer populations moving into and out of the system

Ticks move from mice to deer, and also transmit lymes from mouse to deer

Eventually ticks move from mice or deer to humans, bringing the disease

Relation to ecosystem concepts

Bottom-up control

Pulse and press perturbation

Temporal heterogeneity

Human perturbation

Increased fragmentation favors small mammals (increasing lymes)

Effect of increased biodiversity is context dependent

Mitigation tactic

Ecosystem dynamics approach, determineing interactions between different populations and human perturbances