In my neck of the woods, some places are absolute tick hot spots. If I need to photograph ticks or study their habits, I know exactly where to go.
But until last week, I didn’t know that a particular shrub was strongly associated with tick abundance. A new study found this to be true, and we can now add this species to the growing list of plants that sustain ticks.
What is this shrub? And why do ticks love spending so much time near it?
In the following video, I answer these questions and discuss why we shouldn’t be too surprised to see things moving in this direction.