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Woodsmen, butchers say Maine moose, deer crawling with ticks

Terry Karkos | Sun Journal

Jerrold Mason, left, points out bear tooth marks in a moose antler held by his father, James Mason of West Paris. Jerrold said recently that bears will eat sections of shed antlers when they leave their winter dens in the spring, but they won't touch moose and deer carcasses that are laden with ticks.

By Terry Karkos, Sun Journal

Posted Dec. 02, 2011, at 6:39 a.m.

WEST PARIS — Moose and deer tick infestations this year are among the worst that woodsmen and big-game meat processors have seen.

They’re blaming the population boom on unseasonably warm weather and the lack of prolonged deep freezes during winter.

Shed antler hunters such as Jerrold Mason of West Paris and Eric Hall of Jackman noticed the problem this past spring when they found more than 60 dead moose from the Upper Androscoggin River Valley to the Jackman region.

“These are definitely not winter kill,” Mason said recently. “Of the typical winter kill animals like moose, it gets sick, it stands in a small area and basically you find 400 moose droppings and a dead moose in the middle of it.”

But what Mason and Hall are labeling as tick kills are dead moose still laden with so many ticks that predators won’t touch them.

“That’s our guess,” Hall, 32, said Wednesday afternoon.

He and a few friends said they found 50 dead moose calves and adult moose this year in the Jackman region while looking for horns and doing some spring fishing.

“Every single one that I had found and that the other guys had found, the snow was just starting to come off them and they were totally untouched, so it’s obvious it’s not a predator kill,” Hall said. “You could see ticks right on them.”

“Personally, I found 11,” Mason said of the dead moose he discovered from the Western Foothills to the Rangeley area.

“The coyotes wouldn’t eat them; the bears wouldn’t eat them; and they were all the way up through (Jackman), and those guys up there found the biggest bunches of them,” he said.

“It’s a devastating thing when you’re out there and you find a dead cow moose and you find last year’s calf within a few hundred yards from her and not even knowing what’s inside of (the cow) — what she lost — so we’re losing a whole generation,” Mason said.

Normally, Hall said he’d find one to five dead moose every spring.

“Myself personally, I counted 25 this year,” he said. “And then, I started talking to my buddies, and between two other guys, we got up to 50.”

Since then, Hall said he’s learned of more dead moose found by other friends.

“It was really alarming the way everybody was talking about it,” he said. “It’s enough, you know, to raise an eyebrow; you start taking notice and that’s why I really started counting.”

“In years past, there’s always going to be a few weak ones that just aren’t going to make it, but in my time in the woods — and I’ve lived in Jackman my whole life — I’ve never seen anything like it,” Hall said.

Mason, who makes furniture from shed antlers and owns Mason Antler Design, compiled a list of dead moose numbers after talking with Hall and other antler hunters.

Eighteen people, including Mason, found 142 dead moose across Wildlife Management Districts 2, 4, 7, 8 and 12, which stretch from the Western Foothills to Aroostook County.

Mason said he gave the list to Gov. Paul LePage when he was in Rumford this summer, and also to the Legislature’s Inland Fisheries and Wildlife Advisory Council.

Mason said he’d like to see the state conduct a broad-based spraying program targeting deer and moose ticks and insects that are harming the state’s forests.

But Dick Sprague and Steve Harris of Minot said Wednesday that they believe a prolonged deep freeze is needed to destroy thriving tick populations.

“I think we need a winter without any snow and about minus 30 (degrees) for a month and a half, because that’s the only way you’re going to get rid of them,” said Sprague, a deer and moose meat processor and taxidermist who owns Trophies Unlimited.

Sprague said that so far this year, they’ve processed 130 deer and a dozen moose and all have been covered with ticks. He gets checked every December for Lyme disease, which is carried by deer ticks.

“I know a lot of guys are starting to require you pre-skin your animals you’re bringing in to be processed,” he said.

“We’re still doing it,” he said. “We wear Tyvek suits, so that way you can see what you’ve got crawling on you. It’s not a good thing. It’s unpleasant, but you do the best you can to deal with it.”

Harris, a second-generation deer and moose meat processor who owns Harris Custom Cutting, said that before processing deer and moose, he sprays himself with insect repellent.

“I’ve never seen a year like this and I’ve been doing this for 27 years,” Sprague said. “Skinning these heads, you’re crawling with ticks after you get done. It’s definitely a crazy season.”

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Anonymous

prescribed burns kill ticks in the woods. too much hardwood scrub. maine does a good job managing trees, but not such a good job managing its forests.
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_7T3YNF6MG3FPEAVTFIJC44VQUI Dlbrt

This Ticks me off!
Anonymous

If an abnormally high number of moose fatalities is observed by people who are familiar with the seasonal rhythms of this species in a given region, state biologists should be contacted so that some of the carcasses–or samples from them–can be collected for necropsy/testing. This does not sound like “tick kill” and perhaps another explanation would be found, including a possible new disease. It is greatly concerning to hear that so many moose of all ages did not make it through the winter and certainly not a finding that should go without further investigation.
Anonymous

At least its not due to climate change!

But, really, maybe things like this and that’s in the 50′s and 60′s around Thanksgiving will help convince the doubters of climate change.
Anonymous

My buck didn’t have a single bug on him. My father in law, whos been cutting meat for 50+ years, said my deer was the best meat he’d ever seen come out of the woods.
Anonymous

I certainly concur that Maine has a large, and growing tic problem which it did not have years ago.

But I would like to see more info from someone in the scientific community on this story. Based on what I have seen, and what I can find in my research, tics do not tend to stay on a dead animal for any great length of time. I can certainly believe a fresh-killed deer might be loaded with them, depending on what part of the state it was taken in, it is a bit more difficult to believe that a months old carcass would still be covered with tics. Tics feed on blood and when an animal dies either the blood drains from the system or coagulates in the blood vessels. There would be nothing on the former host for the tic to ingest so I would suspect he would move on soon.

It seems to me that these gents sound like the same two in another BDN story a couple of weeks ago, about coyotes, where they bragged they had “gotten rid of all the wolves” and were going to “get rid of the coyotes too” as the only good coyote was a dead one.

A statement like that demonstrates a significant lack of knowledge of biology, just for starters.

Since most deer in Maine are loaded with tics, why would coyotes kill and eat any of them, if this statement above is true. These gents need to make up their mind which way it is as you can’t have it both ways. If tics keep predators from killing and eating prey animals, why worry about the coyotes, they will soon starve to death according to your ideas.
Anonymous

The word is “ticks”
Anonymous

I agree ticks leave a dead animal when blood stops flowing. And I’m no scientist, but I’m sorry, I really can’t see a coyote being picky when they find a free meal. How would they know it has ticks on it anyways… Smell?
Anonymous

Whoa controversial, prescribed burns we can’t do that we need to save our forests for a park, and all the equipment that we’d need would just ruin the forest. But seriously when is the last time people burned their fields, it’s a practice that has died out unless you own blueberry barrens, and I don’t recall ever finding a tick in all the time I’ve spent in those unless it was on a rabbit. Bring back prescribed burns along forest edges and fields and you’ll see a drop in tick numbers.
Anonymous

My leg got covered in moose ticks once while orienteering luckily I was wearing light colored clothing and saw them quickly enough before they spread all over and burned them off my pants. I was sure to check myself thoroughly that night. But I remember seeing a bit on Nat geo or Discovery about moose being affected by large numbers of ticks so I’d believe it, but of all the animals that I’ve shot the parasites tend to leave the body when the host dies, so unless it’s a carcass that is within twelve hours old I doubt you’ll find a multitude of ticks on it, maybe moose ticks will stay on a carcass because they will cluster and wait for a host to walk by, but deer ticks I don’t think do that.
Anonymous

I had a deer tick crawling on my arm last Saturday. Nov 26th come on!! Had the creepy crawlies for the rest of the weekend.
Anonymous

I found ticks on me almost everyday when hunting in district 26. It’s gross to pick those things off you with tweezers. Ticks, coupled with the lack of deer, made for a forgetable hunting season.
http://www.tohic.com Matthew

We have a large herd of deer around our house, the last couple years I’ve found more Ticks on our dogs than ever before, it’s almost gotten to the point that I don’t want to let them run around the yard. They get Frontlined, but we still have to comb through their fur daily to remove Ticks (and they are Siberian Husky’s, so Lots o thick fur to get through!)
Anonymous

My dogs were finding more ticks than partridge and woodcock this fall. I’d hate to drag a deer home with those little %#*^@ attached.
Anonymous

and, at one time there was a mile high glacier covering Maine.
Anonymous

Very sorry to hear that :(
Anonymous

You believe that? It was probably the most handsome buck too. geez.
Anonymous

Thats not good, hunting naked? They don’t bite through clothes and attach to human skin. Lyme disease is a terrible curse. IF I was you buddy, I would be seeking medical attention TODAY! The can start you on some meds to help “table” the disease. IF you get a rash around one of those bite marks, do not mess around, seek attention now.
Anonymous

I am with you. The dog sure doesn’t understand though. There aren’t alot of ticks down at the bangor waterfront if you can room down there to go run your dog.
Millicent

perhaps they’re dying from something that the other animals can sense in the carcass, and that they should not eat it. I’m wondering if any of the dead animals have been brought in for a necropsy (I think that’s the correct term)….
Anonymous

The cat is out of the bag. Ticks were rampant last summer and I personally have seen moose covered with them. This little fact needs to be factored into the numbers allowed to be killed. The ticks are taking a terrible toll on calfs of both moose and deer. Now we know why the herds are low and the moose estimates so distorted on the high side. Anyone who spends time in the woods know the moose herd is way down.
Anonymous

Why would he lie to me? What doe he have to gain? If it were someone i didn’t know, id think he was full of it, but i’ve known my father in law for almost a decade and he has never lied to me
Anonymous

Not sure which is a better idea, spraying pesticides over the entire state landmass or spraying it all over yourself while you process my family’s venison. And the ticks staying on a dead moose all winter? Who are these people?
Anonymous

my only knowledge of prescribed burning is from Florida – in some areas, they have managed to restore habitat to its original pine forest.

burning fields is just a little different, but the same in that you favor one habitat over another. truth is, when the colonist first arrived, from Canada to Florida along the east coast was almost all pine, with hardwoods concentrated along water. burning is good for pine: kills sick trees, promotes seedling development and thins out hardwood scrub thus reducing the risk of more hazardous lightening strike fires.

ticks reside in hardwood scrub and then fall off as an animal brushes underneath. it seems the tick infestation is a result of too dense a woodland.

and yea. its way controversial. people don’t understand it, obviously.
Guest

how about using military helicopters to kill off the deer and moose, the could easily eradicate them in deer and moose yards . Then the ticks will have no large host anddie off then the moose and deer could be brought in . Turkeys are major carriers as well so we could poison them and then reastablish
http://www.facebook.com/people/Cecil-Gray/1027119962 Cecil Gray

Lessen the Moose kill ratio now!! Stop increasing the kill!!!!!
Anonymous

How about we bring back prescribed burns in fields and forest edges, it’d be better than spraying the whole state, and keep ticks back from where the majority of people will be. You’d still have a problem in the woods but it would be milder. You are typically going to find more ticks in the edge habitat than you will deep in anyway.
Guest

Oh Lord !

Here come the Algorians.
Guest

Prolly just being nice to you for taking his daughter off his hands.
http://www.tohic.com Matthew

Oh i’m in Bar Harbor, so there are plenty of places I can take them, But we own a 3/4 acre woodlot and love to let them roam around, Just have to De-Tickify them every time they come in, Frontline helps as it Kills the Ticks, but doesn’t stop them from getting bitten, At least I’ve gotten quick Tick removal down to a science.
Anonymous

Ticks can go several years without eating, so it is possible that they fed on the animal while it was still alive and then (possibly) stayed with the carcass because it was a good habitat for the winter.
Anonymous

Global Warming and Climate Change have nothing to do with the tick population.
http://www.climatecentral.org/news/global-warming-has-pushed-the-arctic-into-a-new-normal/
Anonymous

They crawl under clothes and bite.

Also, they have to be attached to you for 24 hours or more to transmit Lyme.
Anonymous

Get some guinea fowl. They love eating ticks!
Anonymous

Pesticide is indiscriminate. There’s no way to target only the ticks; the pesticide required to kill them would kill a lot of beneficial insects, too (including bees). Not to mention that you’d be spraying humans with toxins, too.
Anonymous

“I think we need a winter without any snow and about minus 30 (degrees) for a month and a half,because that’s the only way you’re going to get rid of them,” said Sprague”

when does that ever happen?
Anonymous

It’s only going to get worse……….
Anonymous

Oh lord……..here come the deniers I don’t like Al Gore, but I do believe that the overall temp of the planet is warming up. Most people will only be convinced when weather events start killing millions of people though…….typical human nature.
Anonymous

Mmmmmm……..tick infested deer and moose meat. Eat up!
Anonymous

they are external parasites and you have nothing to fear eating meat from an animal that has had ticks, if there was a negative effect of eating animals that have ticks on them, then we likely wouldn’t be eating beef either. Now if there were parasites like tapeworms which there could potentially be as with domestically raised animals then be sure to cook thoroughly.
Anonymous

DDT
Anonymous

That’s true they don’t care if it’s down it’s dinner. Dead animals don’t always get eaten up either though I remember one that just decomposed and was quite rank for a long time. Though more often than not animals take care of it all quickly.
Anonymous

Probably mother natures way to reduce the herd when it is too much for the territory. I read an early game wardens report from the 1890′s and he found hundreds of moose dead in the Musquacook lakes area of Aroostook County so it’s nothing new I guess.
Anonymous

Global Warming research and increase of ticks

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/04/090426182944.htm
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2001/07/010711061024.htm
acadiawoods

At a recent search in L/A, one of the responding dog handlers removed over 200 ticks from her dog and the same from herself. We all had the little demons walking on us but this is the season as is March.
An open winter of below 0 weather would go a long way towards lowering the population.
Anonymous

The last two years in Florida were so cold most of our ticks died…(coldest in recorded history). Our nice weather went to Maine VIA the Gulf Stream and Maine got warmer temperatures than Florida for the past two years. That should be over now. Florida is normal so far and Maine should freeze to death like it used to do. Happy 40 below zero!
Anonymous

Our weather in Florida came directly from Minnesota…(stone cold horrible for us), re-curled out over the Gulf Stream and blasted New England from the South East, with temperate, humidity laden weather, warmed to the point of optimum net accumulation of snow, but not cold at all. The last 2 years Bangor Maine beat Jacksonville Florida temperature wise, most days in winter time.
Anonymous

You should get that this year..La Nina (or) El Nino whatever…different than the last 2 years..
Anonymous

Yes Mam, We burn many thousands of acres of land every year in Florida. After the burn…no ticks…no chiggers and lots of new growth for turkeys, deer, rabbits…… Fire is natures fertilizer and insect control.
Anonymous

I wonder if it is itchy for the deer and moose?
Anonymous

some of the MOST beautiful things i have ever seen are a result of burns.

pine grass. baby pine trees so abundant it’s like golf course grass, but its pure pine land.

zephyr lilies. imagine a black charred ground, just days after a burn, tiny blades of grass just peaking above the blackness, and everywhere the eye can see, white lilies, about 6″ tall, as thick as snow on the black ground.

gorgeous.

notice how pine trees loose their lower branches as they grow? that’s to protect them from fire. their thick bark? more fire protection. pine land wants to be burned every now and then.
Anonymous

Calm down.. Go ice fishing and see the snow fleas…… See them, if they can live so can ticks…
Anonymous

They burn in the National Forests, at least the Sam Houston National Forest, in Texas. I’ve been in there a few times when the ground was smoldering from the fires. You’re right. It takes care of the undergrowth, and areas that ticks and other undesirables live, and also makes for a healthier, happier forest.
Anonymous

I believe ticks become dormant in the winter months and when the weather changes and the snow melts and spring begins the ticks come to.
Anonymous

Not all people who contract Lymes get the rash around the bite…if someone had a tick imbeded and removed it they should go get tested. I know someone who had lyme for 5+ years misdiagnosed and after finally being tested she will never get rid of the havoc it causes her.
Anonymous

My three year old was diagnosed with Lyme. According to the infectious disease specialist in Boston, the tick does need to be attached for 36 hours to transmit the lyme. The typical bulls eye rash (only seen in about 65% of the cases) is caused by the venom of the bite. That fades and a secondary rash may come anywhere on the body. We did not see the tick bite or the bulls eye rash, only the secondary rash. He then became very lethargic, going to bed for the night by four and be exhausted all day the next day. Fortunately, we caught it in time and he is being treated with antibiotics. The doctors feel he will make a full recovery. ( He seems fine now after being on the antibiotics for two plus weeks.) He will however always test positive for Lyme so now we have to watch for the symptoms. Best to get checked. The ones that often carry the lyme are so small you can barely see them. But if caught, the antibiotics works very well.
Anonymous

Six weeks of 30 below weather?

Ain’t gonna happen, not in our lifetime.
Anonymous

Peta member in Guides clothing.
Anonymous

OH crap.. Now i am thinking of when my grandfather told my brother and I about Snow-Snakes. We saw some tracks while on a back road and they scared the crap out of us. Granted we were just wee young uns but still. lol. Makes me laugh even now.
Anonymous

Try to get a burn permit though for your private property.
Anonymous

My back lawn is not “hardwood scrub” but sure as hell, ticks abound there. I take them from the dog often.
Anonymous

You don’t think warmer winter, the melting of the ice caps, etc. aren’t a result of climate change – whether cyclical or man made?
Anonymous

You’ve been watching too many Texas hunting shows.
Anonymous

I thought the same thing when I read that statement………..never gonna happen. I would like to know where he gets scientific background to make such a statement.
Anonymous

Climate Change Deniers are determined to double down on their disbelief, even in the face of all sorts of facts.

So all we have to do is wait and do nothing to stop Earth’s warming. If we don’t seriously ease off burning fossil fuels (coal and oil), we’ll see increased warming and it will be a lot worse than ticks on deer and moose.

Burning coal and oil creates carbon dioxide which floats up into our upper atmosphere and stays there for at least 100 years – so it’s cumulative, being added to every day - and keeps heat inside our atmosphere instead of letting it disperse into outer space.

Once weather events get really violent – more than usual – then even the most vehement Deniers who have fallen prey to the oil and coal industries’ propaganda mouthpieces (Rush Limbaugh, who’s paid handsomely to tell their lies) will have to finally admit that:

Well, yes, all these floods, fierce hurricanes, tornadoes where they never used to be, rising oceans, crazy thunderstorms, and so on just might, possibly, maybe, perhaps be coming from the record warm years we’ve had in the past decade.

Until they feel it themselves, nothing we can say will convince them. Must be 97 percent of the world’s scientists are in cahoots to lie to them. For unknown reasons.

Lots more creatures, good and bad from a human perspective, are moving North every year because their current habitat is getting too warm for them. Unfortunately, plants can’t move, although their seeds are germinating farther North each year now, too.

We now have the destructive Japanese Beetle up here, which is, because lots of pesticides have been used against it in more Southern climes, immune to pesticides. Best to knock them off in early a.m. into can of soapy water (works). But there are termites and lots more warmer-clime creatures on their way here.

Pesticides do not help – they only breed, as with the Japanese Beetles – super-bugs which are immune to our arsenal of poisons. And we get poisoned at the same time when pesticides are sprayed about. Why our high cancer rate?

Everything is connected. Humans are not immune to the pestilences wrought by corporate greed. The use of pesticides is immoral and permanently destructive. DDT is still in the woods and in our bodies, harming babies in utero.

This information is available to anyone – go to Google and type in your question to get scientific answers.

Oh, I forgot – the Deniers don’t believe in science, only ignorant rantings.
Anonymous

It isn’t “Maine” managing Maine’s forests – it’s the paper companies and their Wall Street owners who take whatever’s the most profitable at the moment, grind them up and burn them as fuel or ship the pulp to China (yes, true).
Anonymous

Of course you don’t see ticks in poison-sprayed blueberry fields – those fields are full of pesticides and herbicides and deer with lots of obvious tumors (ask a warden), dead seagulls (now that takes some serious poisons!), surrounded by people’s houses which contain people with diabetes, cancer, diseases of the central nervous system, etc.

I’ll take ticks over pesticides, thank you. If you cover-up properly and do tick checks after you’ve been in the woods, especially check your head’s hairline, you can catch and destroy them. They don’t dig in right away, so you can feel them before they attach.

Just simple common sense works. Check dogs, too.
Anonymous

Still in the earth and poisoning wildlife and humans that eat the poisoned creatures. Carrying it in our bodies where it’s harming fetuses in utero…….has reduced itself to DDE, which is just as bad and here to stay.
Alykins

http://www.tickencounter.org/prevention/mouse_targeted_devices

There is a way to target the mice which give ticks Lyme disease.
No spray, nothing eats it either. The mice use treated nesting material (left in biodegradable tubes) and the ticks stay away. It is the same chemical, permethrin, that is in many flea and tick medications for pets.
Anonymous

It happened a few years ago.
Alykins

You are lucky that you caught it! As you know, not all Lyme cases present with the typical bulls-eye rash that everyone knows about. Best wishes for his full recovery!
Anonymous

The same “scientific answers” like the debunked statistics? Phony, all of it. But then if you believe in the global warming myth, then Chicken Little was right!
Alykins

Neither!! How about stopping ticks from getting Lyme disease in the first place?

http://www.tickencounter.org/prevention/mouse_targeted_devices

Mice are the true enemies here, not the ticks, deer, moose, or coyotes.
In most cases, ticks are not “born” with Lyme disease. They contract it from feeding on white-footed mice (very common in New England) in their first feeding stage.

If only there were a way to prevent ticks from contracting Lyme from mice…
oh wait, there is!

Check that link. But the basic summary is that there are these things called Tick Tubes. They’re cardboard tubes (biodegradable) filled with cotton-y treated nesting material that mice absolutely love to use. The material is treated with permethrin, which is a common chemical in flea/tick medication for pets. The tubes are eco-friendly (as opposed to Kired’s burning method) and safe, a toddler would need to eat more than a pound of the nesting material before getting ‘poisoned’

These work great in yards, I just wish we could get the state to drop them around the way rabies vaccines are left out.
Alykins

Haha, right, we should kill all horses, goats, humans, and dogs too because when the deer, moose, and turkeys are all dead they’ll be the next ones on the feeding chain. ;)
Alykins

http://www.tickencounter.org/p…

Mice are the true enemies here.
In
most cases, ticks are not “born” with Lyme disease. They contract it
from feeding on white-footed mice (very common in New England) in their
first feeding stage.

If only there were a way to prevent ticks from contracting Lyme from mice…
oh wait, there is!

Check
that link. But the basic summary is that there are these things called
Tick Tubes. They’re cardboard tubes (biodegradable) filled with cotton-y
treated nesting material that mice absolutely love to use. The material
is treated with permethrin, which is a common chemical in flea/tick
medication for pets. The tubes are eco-friendly (as opposed to Kired’s
burning method) and safe, a toddler would need to eat more than a pound
of the nesting material before getting ‘poisoned’

These work great in yards, I just wish we could get the state to drop them around the way rabies vaccines are left out.
Anonymous

my guess is they made their way north from the capitol building in DC
http://www.tohic.com Matthew

Thanks for the info, I’ll look into it, As i Said, I’ve got a 3/4 acre woodlot in Bar Harbor, So mice are a huge issue as it’s a perfect habitat for them. So if this stuff works, it could be great for me, Thanks again!
http://twitter.com/krystinnoyes krystin noyes

I agree that ticks are really awful, but I hope we don’t exacerbate the problem by introducing more pesticides into the environment. Pesticides aren’t selective and will affect more than just ticks. However, wild turkeys are one of the biggest natural enemies of ticks! One adult will eat around 200 ticks a day! It would be nice to see us take a natural approach to this problem, and consider introducing some flocks of turkeys into the area!
Anonymous

The “debunked statistics” were scientists asking other climate scientists questions. Read the whole thing.

But, yes, your insisting that climate change is a myth proves what I said – - that many people simply don’t want to think what it could mean to them. They might have to change some over-consuming habits….and that might be uncomfortable.

Too bad, we humans have already done enough damage so that uncomfortable, even dangerous, change is coming.

All we can do now is mitigate the worst – - extreme overheating of earth making it uninhabitable for humans and millions of other species.

Scoff and ridicule all you want. Even a cursory reading of the real science will tell the tale.

Don’t be afraid; understand what needs to be done and then let’s do it so we, our children, the woods, wildlife, fisheries can be kept safer than if we do nothihg to stop the heating – and in some places extreme cooling – of our only place to live, the planet Earth.

The oceans have already warmed and gotten more acidic from industrial filth. Unless you do some reading on the science, you can’t possibly understand the depth of what’s happening to us all.

Please do some searches on Google and do some reading – don’t let oil/coal industry’s pimps….Limbaugh and Faux News….determine what science is or is not.
Anonymous

Isn’t it hard to see the weather change from your Occupy tent? The Earth warms, the Earth cools. 10,000 years ago your tent would have been covered with up to a mile of ice. The Medieval Warming Period was followed closely by the so called “little ice age”. Point being that it has been shown over and over, by both NASA and the UNEP that the climate of Earth fluctuates in an unpredictable manner. In fact, in 2009 at the Copenhagen Conference it was discussed that Climate Change may have hit it’s peak in 1999. In the 1970′s the discussion was about the upcoming Ice Age, and I’m sure that wing nuts such as yourself were on street corners screaming about that. While you and your friends are screaming about Coal/Oil plants while simultaneously protesting that wind turbines are ruining the scenic vistas the rest of us will get back to work. Someone has to pay the taxes that clean up your protest site. I agree that so called “Global Warming/Climate Change” is not a myth. Perhaps we are in a warming cycle. It has been shown, over and over, that so called Climate Scientists have fudged data and hidden data in order to secure large grants. You accuse us of being sell outs? Follow the money.
Anonymous

Thanks. Are you sure you don’t want the cold back?
Anonymous

Those antlers look to have been eaten by rodents, not bears.
Anonymous

you’re mistaken
Anonymous

Well, I’m a bit past sleeping on the cold ground so I haven’t been in an Occupy tent. But I do absolutely sympathize with the Occupy people’s protesting corporate control of our country, and Goldman-Sachs, Wall Street, et al, deliberately bringing down the world’s economy – - primarily to lower people’s wages so we’re all just on the edge of hunger.

Hungry people will do anything for a tiny amount of money – witness the hard labor performed by illegals in this country. They’re desperate so corporations bring them in to work much cheaper than local people.

Never accused you of being a “sell-out,” just a Denier. But you’re not denying climate change (pretty hard to do with a straight face at this point). You’re just denying it’s due to human activity . Okay, then, I guess it’s from sunspots or aliens.

No,you’re wrong. It is from human activity. Just a cursory glance at scientific data will tell you this.

Coal and oil companies hire many people search for websites which allow comments, so they can interfere when the words “climate change” appear.

Then these moles come in and denigrate the messenger (me, this time), denigrate the message, and tell us it’s all quite normal, not to worry.

Well, we’d all best worry. With corporations unwilling to back off using coal – the worst offender – we’re headed for unprecedented climate disasters.

If people choose to do nothing and Deny that climate change is occurring, we’ll just have to wait and see – and it won’t be long coming.
Anonymous

I’ve been all over organic fields as well and have yet to find a tick in those.
Anonymous

Not mentioned but what has captured the attention of vets…..we don’t just have an infestation of our 3 most common ticks: deer (black legged ticks which carry lyme disease), wood, and dog ticks….there is now a 4th tic that is being seen in alarmingly high numbers and it’s carrying a disease never seen in this area before.

http://www.mltn.org/conservation_story/2011/11/ticks-lyme-disease-land-trusts.html

Our shorter, wetter, and more mild winters have had a very noticeable affect on our tick population as well as the expanding list of ticks now living in our woods. There is no question that our climate is changing….and ticks are another indicator that we’ve been studying to 20 plus years and the data is profound.

Your best protection is DEET and to avoid areas with lots of leaves on the ground….favorite habitat of deer ticks. If you have compost piles….keep them away from your lawn and where you and your family spend time outdoors!
Anonymous

Some people sweat the small stuff…
Not I…… And Snow fleas do exist…..
Anonymous

thanks for posting this.
As with all things in life consciousness changes when humans have a vested self interest
Unfortunately we are past the point of no return with Global Warming
see http://www.heatisonline.org

I also recommend watching the documentary COLLAPSE
see http://www.disclose.tv/action/viewvideo/50078/Collapse__part_1_/
Anonymous

Clean earth…you are FOS! If anyone needs something in our environment to worry about, look up Coronal Mass Ejections CMEs and find out what happens when every transformer in your city is fried from one of these CMEs???!

So what if the earth is warming up…the Vikings use to grow grapes in Greenland a few hundred years ago, FCOL!!

And what is happening down in Antarctica?? Yeah, are they losing any ice, Mr Cleanearth??

As for the ticks, let’s get obama to mandate Frontline Plus for all Maine deer and moose. All hunters are now effectively “occupiers” and demand Frontline Plus for their prey, immediately!
Anonymous

Gee cleanearth, I’d probably provide a more wordy response to your assumptions but I just checked my mail and VOILA, got another check from, looks like exxon/mobil this time…gotta run

hope your tinfoil fedora ain’t pinchin’ your ears!!
Anonymous

Instead of burning the understory, we need to cut down all the oak trees.
2010 was record high year for acorn production, and this year saw major increase in wild mice populations. Hence all those ticks.
Fall 2011 is proving record low acorn crop. We should see major drop in mouse numbers and, let’s hope, proportional easing of tick problem.
(Apparently these large swings in acorn production are normal, but 2010/2011 was an extreme example.)
Personally, I never saw a tick until I moved to Maine. Ticks and slugs — our less photogenic wildlife.
Anonymous

yeah right no pulp goes to china you cant cite an example. and so what if it did wouldnt that mean jobs and a manufacturing base?

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