Hello!

This week is the last official week of my internship, and everything is in the finishing stages.

I finished making changes to the map, which will be up on the Tick Blitz website (New York State Tick Blitz – NEVBD Citizen Sceince (neregionalvectorcenter.com)) soon, most probably within next week. The final product shows the viewer how many of each species of tick were found in each zip code with a pie chart. Here is an example:

This internship has been a fun and interesting experience. I appreciated my first real involvement with fieldwork. It takes effort, time and money to conduct fieldwork. During Tick Blitz week, my mentor Nicole and I drove for hours to several locations each day to drag for and collect ticks. The field work was very dependent on the weather. It was rather hot and sweaty some days, while heavy rains on other days made catching ticks rather difficult.  Because collecting takes time, and different conditions affect the quality and quantity of samples, it is important to transport and preserve the specimens carefully.

Identifying all the collected specimens also took time. First, I practiced using keys to identify each species, then slowly got faster as I saw each life stage and species repeatedly. It was important to identify each specimen carefully and correctly, so that the results and data are as accurate as possible.

I will continue to work on this project in the fall. The lab hopes to test the specimens for pathogens this fall. The results and their implications for public health and wildlife will be interesting to see.

I’m thankful to my mentor Ms. Nicole Foley and faculty advisor Dr. Laura Harrington for advising and supporting me throughout the internship.

 

Hello!

When I posted last week, I mentioned that most of my work has been web based. Now, my primary focus is completing the map to be displayed on the Tick Blitz website. I’ve been working on aggregating the data so that the number of ticks is displayed for each zip code. I’ve been working on a few options for the maps. One displays a circle, where the size of the circle corresponds to the number of ticks found. Another displays a pie chart in the center of each zip code, categorized by the species of tick.

Hello!

These past two weeks have been all web based work. I worked on and finished completing reports to send to all the participants of the Tick Blitz, notifying them how many ticks of each species and what life stage they were in. The main task is working on the map to be displayed on the Tick Blitz website. I worked on coding in R. My goal is to display the number of ticks classified by species and life stage for each zip code in the Hudson Valley. One more task I am working on is analyzing the feedback we received from the participants of the Tick Blitz, so that we can determine what participants liked, loved and what parts needed improvement, so that we can improve the experience for future Tick Blitz events.

Hello Everyone!

I finished identifying the approximately 3000 tick specimens last week. Moving forward, there are still many things to be done. The first task, which I’ve worked on and finished this past week, was to double check certain specimens whose species were unclear, and tallying the type and number of ticks per each participant. The participants are eager to know how many of each species they each collected! I am also working on using the data collected to build a map  on the tick distribution throughout the Hudson Valley. I am coding the map using R, as well as the Leaflet library and Shiny package to build an interactive map. Once the map is completed, it will be visible at New York State Tick Blitz – NEVBD Citizen Sceince (neregionalvectorcenter.com)

Hello Everyone!

These past three weeks have been quite busy. After the Tick Blitz week, during which tick specimens were collected from master gardeners and volunteers from all over the Hudson Valley region, the participants sent in the specimens to the Entomology department here at Cornell University. The participants were asked to provide the vials with the ticks (which were still alive!) and collection sheets. I was responsible for freezing the ticks, then identifying them, moving package by package. Overall, there were approximately 3000 ticks sent in. Of course, it can be hard to differentiate different insects from ticks, especially with the small size, so there were also quite a lot of other species that came in as well. With the identification of all specimens nearly complete, I will be mapping the distribution of each species of tick throughout the Hudson Valley. From observing distribution patterns, we can deduce the prevalence of each species in different regions, and make predictions of what areas they are being introduced to.

Greetings!

I travelled to my home in Orange County on June 12th, so that I could participate in collecting ticks under the guidance of my mentor Ms. Nicole Foley.  During the week, we went to approximately 25 sites in Orange, Rockland, Sullivan, and Delaware Counties. These sites included public parks, trails, and private properties and farms.

The way to collect ticks is by using a tick drag. This drag is made from linen with a string at the top to drag along the ground. The person dragging should record how many of their steps equals 10 meters. Then, s/he should drag for that many steps, and check both sides of the linen for ticks, and record the number of ticks found. This should be done 30 times, for a total of 300 meters of covered ground. While dragging, it is ideal to wear light colored clothing which fully covers the skin. This way, it is easy to find ticks that may crawl on you. One should also wear long, white socks and tape them to the pants s/he is wearing, so that no ticks have the opportunity to crawl into the gap. After the drag is over, one should have someone check his/her back, hairline, and under the arms for any sneaky ticks that may have crawled on.

 

 

A friendly cow and some sheep at Wild Roots Farm!

And finally, here is a falcon tube/vial with several collected tick specimens.

Hello Everyone!

My name is Siddhi Balamurali, and I’m a rising junior majoring in biometry and statistics and biological sciences with a concentration in computational biology.

This page will follow the New York Tick Blitz Project. This project is a civilian service project, with volunteers from different counties throughout New York State volunteering to help. It starts with Tick Blitz week, from June 13 -19. In this window of time, participants will collect ticks from local parks and areas using a tick drag. These ticks will be sent in to Cornell’s Entomology Lab, where the ticks will be identified. This gives an idea of the distribution of ticks throughout the Hudson Valley area of New York State. We hope to focus on the distribution of the Lone Star Tick and the invasive Asian Long Horned tick, and what implications the results may have on public health.