Ticks

Relapsing Fever Tick: General Description The adult soft tick has eight legs, rounded body, dimples on their body, and mouthparts hidden from view when seen from above.     Life Cycle and Common Characteristics Female ticks lay eggs in batches, with each batch of eggs produced after taking a blood meal. A female may lay from 25 to several hundred…

Fowl Tick or Poultry Tick: General Description Fowl ticks are light to dark red-brown (yellowish-brown when starved and slatey-blue when engorged). Adults are about 0.5-0.6 mm long. Mouthparts in nymphs and adults are not visible when viewed from above since they are hidden by the front margin of the tick’s body. The skin is wrinkled.   Credit: CDC Soft Tick…

Camel Tick: General Description Camel tick Hyalomma dromedarii (Acari: Ixodidae) adult male: (a) Ventral and (b) dorsal (Credit: Al-Deeb and Bin Muzaffar, Veterinarywork.org) The dorsal shield of males can reach a length of 3.7–5.8 mm. These hard-bodied ticks are broadly oval in shape. The basic color is yellow- to red-brown. Life Cycle and Common Characteristics The camel tick parasitizes mainly…

Brown Dog Tick: General Description Eggs of the brown dog tick are spherical and dark brown in color. Larvae have three pairs of legs with a body size of approximately 0.5 mm in length and 0.4 mm in width. Nymphs and adults have four pairs of legs and look similar except nymphs are smaller than adults. Nymphs are 1.15 to…

Ticks are the largest group of non-insect parasites of vertebrates. It ranks second after mosquitoes in transmitting diseases to humans. Ticks are not insects, they are arachnids.  This order contains two important groups: ticks and mites.  The life cycle goes through three main stages: eggs, larvae (with six legs), and adults (with eight legs). Ticks have two body parts: the…