Australia: Pet Owners Warned About Tick Boom on East Coast After Last Year's Hot, Wet Summer

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Note the red area on the east coast is where lies the threat of the paralysis tick. (Illustration courtesy of the Karl McManus Foundation.)

Global warming has not only been a boon to mosquitos, but also to disease vector ticks. Pet owners in Australia have been warned about a tick boom unfolding along their east coast, with some experts predicting an unusually bad season for our furry friends.

Veterinary scientist and parasitologist Peter Irwin, an emeritus professor at Murdoch University, said the severity of a tick season was largely determined by the preceding weather, and last summer had been very hot and wet along the east coast”.

“That implies the tick season this year will be bad, and indeed it seems to be panning out that way,” he said.

Paralysis ticks – found along a narrow strip of coastline stretching from north Queensland to Lakes Entrance in Victoria – were responsible for 95% of tick bites in humans, and were potentially lethal to cats, dogs, and other animals.

Factors influencing tick seasons were complex. Temperature and humidity played a key role, as well as the abundance of host animals like kangaroos and bandicoots. “You also have human factors as well – how often are people moving in and out of tick habitat?” he said.

If people or their pets were bitten, it was important to remain calm and not to try to pull the tick off. “You should always freeze it, not squeeze it” using tick-freezing spray from a pharmacist.

On a recent trip to Culburra Beach on the south coast of NSW, Eleanor removed 39 live ticks from her four-year-old Finnish lapphund, Beans.


Beans, a Finnish lapphund, had no fewer than 39 ticks removed while on a holiday at Culburra Beach on the New South Wales coast, her owner said. (Photo: The Guardian)

She was aware it was tick season but “had no idea it would be like this”, she said. Beans was “crawling with parasites”.

“The number of ticks we found on her was nightmarish,” she said. “We spent every evening when the kids went to bed pulling ticks out of her fur.”

Irwin said adult paralysis ticks, mainly active between August and December, were a serious concern for pet owners and veterinarians.


Australian paralysis tick (Ixodes holocyclus). (Photo: Peter Rowland)

“Cats and dogs, untreated, will die of tick paralysis. Even treating them is not always successful,” he said. Luckily the disease was largely preventable, with effective collars, tablets, and treatments.

Prof Ala Tabor, an animal health specialist with the Queensland alliance for agriculture and food innovation at the University of Queensland, said the larger an animal was the more likely it would be able to survive paralysis tick toxins.

This season the university lost a cow to paralysis ticks, Tabor said.

Tabor was developing a paralysis tick vaccine for cats and dogs that was being licensed to an Australian company.

Once a vaccine was available, an annual dose would probably be cheaper and easier for pet owners and could provide a solution for animals that had adverse reactions to chemicals in common treatments.

Sources:

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/oct/25/dog-owners-warned-about-boom-in-ticks-on-australias-east-coast-after-last-years-hot-wet-summer

https://www.australiangeographic.com.au/fact-file/fact-file-australian-paralysis-tick-ixodes-holocyclus/

https://karlmcmanus.org.au/who-we-are/

https://nexgard.com.au/dog-parasites/tick-check