01:00 AM EST on Monday, December 27, 2004
The Provident Journal

By Arthur Gregg Sulzberger
Journal Staff Writer

NARRAGANSETT -- Researchers from the University of Rhode Island have postponed a tick control project that was scheduled to begin this fall.

The project, billed as the largest in the nation, uses special deer feeding stations featuring a hard to access bowl of corn and four pesticide-laced rollers. Struggling to eat, a deer must rub its head and neck, where 90 percent of deer ticks are found, against the rollers.

Despite securing $910,000 in federal funding and 40 of the plastic feeding units, the project stalled as the research team struggled to find enough adequate sites for the feeders in town.

"There are so many constraints about where you can put up these things," said Thomas Mather, director of URI's Center for Vector-
Borne Disease and a leading expert on ticks, citing restrictions concerning the placement of the feeders near houses or near sites
used by children.

Nevertheless, Mather said he has already received "a dozen or more" offers from residents willing to house the units on private property, and has been examining maps of town in an effort to find more sites
in areas heavily trafficked by deer.

Mather said he hopes to find the necessary sites and have the project up and running by spring. Adult deer ticks, also known as black-legged ticks, are most active in mid-fall and early spring.

Rhode Island has the nation's second highest incidence of Lyme disease, a potentially fatal illness contracted through the bite of a deer tick. Most in-state cases occur in South County.

This summer, Mather held a series of educational tick control workshops in backyards around the county. He is hopeful that the feeders will help curb tick-induced illnesses, which continue to rise
despite effective control methods. Previous studies found a 60 percent decline in tick populations in the area around the units.