Do ticks die in the winter?

Blacklegged ticks that didn't find a host in fall are still looking. They sit in leaf litter and at the base of tall grass and become active whenever the ground isn't frozen, which on Long Island is most of the winter. Dogs pick them up on winter walks through brush. Deer keep moving through yards all winter and keep dropping engorged ticks that lay eggs in the leaf litter for spring.

The CDC's yard list works in winter too: clear leaf litter, which is where ticks overwinter, cut back brush at the lawn edge, keep the 3-foot wood chip or gravel border between lawn and woods, stack firewood off the ground, and fence out deer. Fall leaf cleanup is tick control. Tick checks after winter yard work and dog walks still matter, and the New York State Department of Health's repellent guidance, DEET or picaridin on skin and permethrin on clothing, applies whenever you're in brush.

The state names Long Island as one of the two highest-risk regions in New York for tick-borne disease (NYS Department of Health), and the mild winters here mean more active winter days than upstate. Tick treatments of the habitat zones are a spring-through-fall program, timed to the nymph peak from May to July, and leaf litter removal in fall is the winter half of the job.