[MikeBear]

Originally Posted by sierranevada1

Are there more Black Flies near water usually?

Near clear running water. Even a sluggish stream, but has to be running at least a bit.

So, along with the horrible black flies, they are slightly balanced out by the fact they are only around the best healthy waters. Not that I would personally drink from them unpurified, but that the black flies don't tolerate pollution of any sort.

[Giesela]

I don't know what rock people here have been living under.

I grew up in southern Michigan, born 1956 and ran the fields with nary a tick. Saw my first tick in the early 90s and its been steadily increasing since then. Ticks are very common around Michigan now. I'm on a lot of nature and birding listservs, groups etc. and there are A LOT OF TICKS out there. A nature biologist who does a lot of field survey's in the UP (and is a UP resident) has had Lyme several times.

And this is shaping up to be a really bad year. Many reports of ticks already. Mushroom hunter in Leelanau county pulled 5 off their dog. Bird watchers at Tawas Point the same. I've pulled one off the cat already in Calhoun County.
While both dog/wood ticks and deer ticks can be found in both woodsy and open grassy places, dog/wood ticks are generally more the open grassy area types and deer ticks more the woodsy type.

As for the UP - YES THERE IS LYME, almost especially in the western part. Not sure how bad the ticks are, I mean thats all relative anyway, what is bad? But there have been reported cases of Lyme in over half the counties in the UP.

Scroll down this article for a map.

https://www.freep.com/story/news/loc...ous/481723002/

[sierranevada1]

Originally Posted by Giesela

I don't know what rock people here have been living under.

I grew up in southern Michigan, born 1956 and ran the fields with nary a tick. Saw my first tick in the early 90s and its been steadily increasing since then. Ticks are very common around Michigan now. I'm on a lot of nature and birding listservs, groups etc. and there are A LOT OF TICKS out there. A nature biologist who does a lot of field survey's in the UP (and is a UP resident) has had Lyme several times.

And this is shaping up to be a really bad year. Many reports of ticks already. Mushroom hunter in Leelanau county pulled 5 off their dog. Bird watchers at Tawas Point the same. I've pulled one off the cat already in Calhoun County.
While both dog/wood ticks and deer ticks can be found in both woodsy and open grassy places, dog/wood ticks are generally more the open grassy area types and deer ticks more the woodsy type.

As for the UP - YES THERE IS LYME, almost especially in the western part. Not sure how bad the ticks are, I mean thats all relative anyway, what is bad? But there have been reported cases of Lyme in over half the counties in the UP.

Scroll down this article for a map.

https://www.freep.com/story/news/loc...ous/481723002/

I've seen this map earlier (the good thing though it takes only 2 local exposures to mark the county red).
I found another version of this map which shows the number of cases (locally acquired) per county:

MDHHS Michigan Disease Mapper
(if the link does show results one needs to select new Search and search in human disease section)
Screenshot:


Looks like in most of the affected counties it's only several cases, the count being unusually high (30) in Dickinson County in the UP. I guess this is where the most traffic from Wisconsin (where most Lyme is) is happening.
Looks like really need to watch out for deer ticks when camping...
The above site also has a map of infection in submitted deer ticks which shows different distribution than in human Lyme cases: extra cluster in South-Eastern Michigan.

It's still a lot better than another area I'm considering (on the East coast) which got up to thousands of cases per county and the rate (per 100,000 people) being 50 times higher than in MI statewide.

[sierranevada1]

Originally Posted by MikeBear

Near clear running water. Even a sluggish stream, but has to be running at least a bit.

So, along with the horrible black flies, they are slightly balanced out by the fact they are only around the best healthy waters. Not that I would personally drink from them unpurified, but that the black flies don't tolerate pollution of any sort.

Sounds like Black Flies are more selective with water than humans...huh. I wish they applied the same standards before deciding to bite.

[Giesela]

Not sure the date or source of the blue map. The map I linked to has far more extensive coverage.

And this morning a friend on facebook posted she found a deer tick on her husband and he has the bullseye rash. Calhoun County.

[sierranevada1]

Originally Posted by Giesela

Not sure the date or source of the blue map. The map I linked to has far more extensive coverage.

And this morning a friend on facebook posted she found a deer tick on her husband and he has the bullseye rash. Calhoun County.

The difference in maps is mainly because of methodology.
The freep site map you linked colors the county red if either there're at least 2 Lyme human cases or any local ticks were submitted that carried Lyme. It colors pink if the county "may have Lyme ticks"/prediction.
The MI Public Health map I linked colors counties based on the number of human cases of locally acquired Lyme (not caught, say, on a hunting trip to WI but in MI). This map was for 2016. The more recent option they have is year 2017, with very similar result.

As I mentioned above, MI Public Health search in my link also has an option for infected deer tick locations search (based on ticks brought in by people), which shows wider distribution similar to the map you posted.

MI Public Health human Lyme cases caught locally, 2017:



MI Public Health infected deer tick map (based on ticks brought in by people) 2018 - they have no option to narrow it down for Lyme only so other deer tick-bourn diseases might be included:



So, red-color map is close to overlay of both blue maps + projected risk counties (where no known Lyme was detected so far but expected)