With the temperatures on Martha’s Vineyard dipping into the single digits and struggling to get above freezing, a question has been on the mind of Islanders: what does this mean for the pesky tick?
It’s something that Patrick Roden-Reynolds, the tick biologist for the Dukes County tick program, is often asked about.
He has some good, but mostly bad, news.
When the mercury drops this low, the deer, dog and lone star ticks that have plagued the Island have to seek shelter in the Vineyard leaf cover, which has been sitting under about a foot of snow. The temperatures will keep them there, and the extra snowpack could mean they emerge later than usual this spring.
But those hoping the current freeze and deep snow will provide a reprieve heading into the season will have to face a harsh truth. Ticks can handle this, and will be back once the Island thaws out.
“It’s definitely a question on a lot of people’s minds,” said Mr. Roden-Reynolds, who has been studying the Island’s ever-growing tick epidemic since 2022. “I wouldn’t really expect the temperature to affect the tick population too much….We’ll see.”
This answer may not be revelatory for old salts who have seen deer ticks return year after year, spreading Lyme and other diseases. The species that feeds on its namesake is native to New England and can also bounce back from winters on the frozen tundras of Minnesota and Wisconsin.
“Those winters regularly reach below zero and have long deep snowpacks,” said Mr. Roden-Reynolds. “And those deer ticks do fine up there.”
The recent arrival of the lone star ticks, which has been causing Islanders to have allergic reactions to red meat, dairy and other animal products, has raised other questions, though. The lone star tick was previously largely contained to the southeast and midwest regions of U.S., but has made a foray into New England as the colder, harsher winters of yore have receded.
That has led researchers to wonder how this southern species would fare under colder conditions. Dr. Megan Linske, an ecologist who has studied ticks for the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station in New Haven, conducted tests to find out.
Over several years, Ms. Linske researched ticks in her home Nutmeg State as well as Maine, known for some of the most bracing winters in the northeast.
With her team, Ms. Linske placed ticks in buckets in Hampden, Conn. and Cape Elizabeth, Me. with several different conditions. Some got snow, others got leaves, while others received combination of the two or lacked both.
In Connecticut, the temperatures for the multi-year study largely hovered just above freezing while in Maine the temperatures were all below freezing, sometimes as low as the mid-20s.
What the scientists found, according to the 2019 study, was that despite coming from the south, the ticks did handle temperatures in Connecticut better than in Maine, but even in Maine many were surviving.
“We had an overwhelming number of them survive the winter,” Ms. Linske said. “In general, the lone star is a hardy tick. Winters are not creating a limiting factor for them.”
Female lone stars, which sport the eponymous white dot on their backs, fared better than their male counterparts, probably because they grow larger.
That doesn’t mean the cold can’t kill ticks. A 1996 study by the University of Ohio tested various life stages of the lone star under different temperatures and time-frames. Fed and unfed larvae, nymphs and adults, all died when faced with near zero temperatures for a week; adults could tolerate 14 degrees for eight days.
Blake Dinius, an entomologist with the Plymouth County Extension, said that low temperatures can have an effect, but places like Plymouth and Martha’s Vineyard just don’t get cold enough for long enough stretches. Snow also can work as an insulator in these cases.
Even if there were reductions, the tick population in southeastern Massachusetts is so established that it doesn’t make too much of a difference when it comes to the risk of Lyme and other diseases.
“I don’t think the temperatures are getting cold enough down here to do too much, or enough to change our decisions on public health,” Mr. Dinius said.
Because of this resiliency among the ticks, New England scientists urged proactive steps for people to protect themselves, such as treating clothes with permethrin.
The fact that the Vineyard is interested in the overwinter survival of ticks, was an indicator that the Island is taking the problem seriously, Ms. Linske said, and now may be the time to start looking at the hosts and habitat that make the area so attractive to ticks.
“While we can focus on over-wintering survival, there are just so many other pieces that go into place. It’s a very hard thing,” she said. “It’s going to require more integrated tick management… We’ve reached the point where now it’s time for intervening.”
This article appears in February 13, 2026.
Ticks are more than ”pesky”. They are dangerous.
“We’ve reached the point where now it’s time for intervening.” It is long overdue for there to be an island wide coordinated action to reduce the deer population. We need to consider birth control through inoculation, bait traps. Or they coordinated harvesting of deer meat to be sent to population suffering from hunger. But just telling people to spray their clothing with chemicals is no longer than effective response. I know as I have Alpha gal syndrome and became seriously ill.