Science Friday - Mannequins Help Teach People How To Spot Ticks | Protecting A Flickering Symbol Of Summer Nights

Episode Date: June 20, 2024

Two mannequins walk into a science lab, and one’s got a big tick problem. She can teach humans how to check for ticks. Also, researchers used citizen science observations and machine learning to understand where fireflies are and what they need to thrive.In Wisconsin, Mannequins Help Teach People How To Spot TicksNationwide, Wisconsin is a hot spot for Lyme disease. And cases are rising, as climate change and development alter how humans interact with the ticks that transmit this disease. In Wisconsin, cases reported annually have more than doubled in the last two decades.With tick season underway, tick checks are one of the most important ways you can prevent infection. I recently visited the Midwest Center of Excellence for Vector-borne Disease, which is housed at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where researchers are using a new tool to teach people how to do tick checks — mannequins.Read the rest at sciencefriday.comProtecting A Flickering Symbol Of Summer NightsWhen people talk about watching fireflies, a common comment is “You know, I don’t see as many fireflies as I used to.” Researchers are trying to figure out whether that impression is actually accurate, and which of the over 2,000 firefly species might be affected—and to do so, they need a lot more data. A recent paper published in the journal Science of the Total Environment used over 24,000 citizen science observations as well as machine learning models to try to better identify where certain species of fireflies can be found, and what types of habitat and climate they need to thrive.Dr. Sarah Lower, a firefly researcher at Bucknell University and a co-author of the study, joins guest host Annie Minoff to talk about some ways to protect fireflies near you, including preserving darkness and providing moist, permeable, natural soils for firefly larvae.Transcripts for each segment will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com. Subscribe to this podcast. Plus, to stay updated on all things science, sign up for Science Friday's newsletters.

Are there fewer fireflies than once upon a time? To find out, we need more data. We are looking at fireflies as sort of a charismatic species that folks care about. Studying fireflies can tell us more about how to manage habitats for insects in general. It's Thursday, June 20th. Happy summer solstice. You're listening to Science Friday. I'm SciFri producer Charles Bergquist.

Fireflies are one of the iconic symbols of a warm summer night in the wild. Coming up, we'll hear how scientists in the public are surveying firefly habitats to find out what species live where and what they need to thrive. But first, how researchers are trying to protect you from another type of summertime encounter, a meetup with a bitey tick. So stop me if you've heard this one before. Two leggy brunettes walk into a science lab. Well, not walk exactly. Vanessa and Valerie are mannequins, and their job is to teach us humans how to check for ticks. Ticks, of course, are a well-known summer nuisance in many parts of the country.

But climate change is extending their season. Joining me today to talk about this is my guest, Lena Tran, reporter for WUWM, Milwaukee's NPR. Welcome to Science Friday. Thanks for having me. Of course. So I understand you took a trip to this lab where these two mannequins, Vanessa and Valerie, have become a pretty important educational tool. So explain how mannequins can help us learn to spot ticks.

Yeah, okay, so it all starts a few years ago. You might be familiar with this viral tweet from the CDC. They shared this photo of a poppy seed muffin that just went viral and made everyone go crazy. I remember, Lena. I will never forget, but continue. It had five ticks that were camouflaged among the seeds. And the idea was to show people how small ticks can be and just be like, hey, be vigilant, you know. But it's pretty unlikely that you're going to run into ticks.

on a muffin, right? Yes. Thank you for. Yeah. So I met these researchers at the Midwest Center of Excellence for Vector Born Disease. It's this lab at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. And they're trying to figure out better ways to teach people how to do tick checks, which are a really important part of preventing tick-borne disease.

So they were like, wouldn't it be better to show people what ticks look like on a person? That's the idea behind the mannequins. They show you what ticks look like in context and kind of train your eye. So that's how I met Valerie and Vanessa to very nice brunette lady mannequins. The scientists glued 16 dead ticks to them. Oh. And they challenged me to find them all. And honestly, it was eye-opening.

It was not an easy task. How did you do? They said that my results were pretty much on par with the average. So people on average were finding seven out of the 16 mannequin ticks. Okay. So I hate ticks. Just really not a fan. And a big reason is that they are just so hard to spot.

They are so tiny. So what did these researchers tell you about how to find these guys more effectively? They are so hard to spot. You know, when I was looking for them, I kept second guessing myself. Like, is this a piece of fluff or is it an actual tick? So the researchers have been taking the mannequins around to events, and they got some information on how you can boost your tick check success rate. So one thing they learned is dress for success.

The researchers had Valerie in all white and Vanessa was in all black, and people are much better at finding ticks on lighter clothes. I actually realize that I have the same black pants as Vanessa. They're from Target. No way. Yeah, this experience made me want to go back and get the white ones. People are also better at spotting them on their upper body than the lower body, so you should pay special attention to your legs. And then one of the researchers at the lab told me that she tucks her pants. into her socks and her shirt into her pants when she's out, which limits access to your skin.

And then when it's time for the tick check, you know, be systematic. I was a little chaotic. I was like, ooh, I'm going to look at the armpit and like now the knees. But you really should start at the feet and then work your way up. So I used to think of ticks as pretty much exclusively a summer problem, but it feels like I'm finding them all the time now. Is that my imagination or has the tick season actually gotten longer? Ugh, it's not your imagination. Climate change is causing tick season to start earlier and last longer. Like this year, Wisconsin actually had its warmest winter on record,

and the State Department of Health Services got their first tick ID requests in February. Usually, people start sending those in in late March or early April. So that was a lot earlier. A doctor here in Milwaukee told me that we need to rethink tick season. So instead of thinking about ticks at a certain time, time of year, we need to think about them at a certain temperature, which is about 40 degrees. So basically, experts told me the rule of thumb is when it's nice enough that you want to go out, so do the ticks. Great. Great news, Lena. So if you are unlucky enough to find one of these little guys attached to you,

what is the best way to remove them? Okay, so you want to get some clean tweezers and remove them as soon as possible. You pull the tick up with steady, even pressure. And Tila Jemsch is a research specialist at this lab that I went to. She told me it's important to get as close as possible to your skin when you're pulling it. Here's why. What you really want to make sure that you don't do is grab the tick by its body, because if you do that, you'll essentially cause them to regurgitate what's in their stomach into you, and that could potentially have pathogens.

Lovely. Lovely. It's so disgusting. I'm so sorry. So yeah, once it's taken care of, you should keep an eye on it. The CDC says that if you get a rash or a fever within a few weeks of removing a tick, you should see your doctor. All right, wise words. That is all the time we have for now, but I would like to thank my guest, Lena Tran, reporter for WUWM, Milwaukee's NPR. Thanks for joining us.

Thanks for having me. One of the trademark signs of summer is the flickering dance of fireflies in the evening. And a comment you hear a lot when you're talking about. talking about fireflies is, you know, I don't see as many as I used to. But is that actually true? And if so, is there anything that people can do to help improve firefly numbers? Joining me to talk about that is Dr. Sarah Lauer, Assistant Professor of Biology at Bucknell University. And she's one of the co-authors of a recent paper looking at firefly numbers published in the journal Science of the Total Environment. Dr. Lauer, welcome to Science Friday.

Thank you so much. So is that something that you hear a lot from people as a firefly researcher? Do they say, you know, where did all the fireflies go? I have heard where do all the fireflies go or where have all the fireflies gone since I started firefly research about 13 years ago. That is one of the most frequent questions. And what do you tell people? Well, it used to be that I would say, you know, I hear that a lot, but we don't have a lot of

data backing that up. More recently, we've been getting more data from around the world, different parts of the world, to actually document these declines. And it doesn't seem to be for every species, but for some of these species, that seems to be the case. And this study, as I understand it, looked at a ton of citizen science observations. So tell me about that. What were people looking for? So this work was done in collaboration with Darren McNeil from the University of Kentucky and researchers at Penn State, including Christina Grosinger, Sarah Gosley, Melanie Camer, and John Tucker, as well as collaborations with the USDA. And it's based on data gathered from a citizen science project. So this is when we get people who are interested in helping us

figure out where fireflies occur. They go out in their backyard or if they're out camping or hiking, wherever they are, they actually log their firefly siting into this database. It's online. And so over time, this collected over 20,000, I think, observations. And we can use all of those data points to then do some modeling about what are potential threats to have fireflies and what are potential places where we expect fireflies to occur. What's a good firefly habitat look like? Well, let's follow up on that. What is a good firefly habitat? If I'm a firefly, kind of what do I need to thrive? So for the sightings that we looked for in this study, which were most dominated by firefly species that are really common and abundant and active around sunset when most people are out grilling or whatever you, catching fireflies with your kids, that sort of thing. With this data set that was probably dominated by those species, firefly habitats are dark, so they don't include a lot of artificial light, moist.

So they have a lot of organic matter in the soil that helps retain moisture. And if a drought happens in the summer, sort of buffered against that really intense heat and lack of moisture. It also is fairly clear of impervious services. So not a lot of concrete or asphalt. There are ways where fireflies to get to the soil to lay their eggs and to be larvae. So they spend one to two years as a larvae. Wow. Yes.

That's a long childhood. If you think about it, the fireflies that you see this year are actually the parents are the ones that you'll see two years from now, potentially. And they actually may be the offspring of the ones you saw two years ago. They are predators. They eat soft-bodied invertebrates like slugs and snails. and worms. And so you need these moist areas with access to the soil to be able to have a good larval environment. So you know what fireflies need. You have all of this citizen science data. What does it take to actually say whether there are, in fact, fewer fireflies overall?

So for that, we are going to need way more data. And this is when this opportunity to speak with you offers me a great platform to encourage your list. Oh, are we recruiting right now? We are recruiting. We would love to get more people involved with helping us find out when and where fireflies are occurring so we can actually figure out our declines happening. Where are they happening? What species are they happening to? And all of this can be done in concert with the Firefly Atlas Project.

So this is run through the Xerces Society. There are training documents online on how to fill out the observation forms. and it will all be curated and added to this growing database of firefly sightings that we can use in the future. So like with monarch butterflies, for example, people talk about planting the right kind of milkweed to help that species out. Is there anything equivalent that I could do to help fireflies in my area? With fireflies, they are not pollinators that we know of. They do not have a host plant that we know of. But what you can do on your own in your own backyard or your own business is to practice

firefly friendly land management. So for example, you could, if you have bright lights around you, plant trees that will grow up and provide dark environments in part of your yard. You could turn off your lights or set them on some sort of timer so that they turn off after a certain period and will have less impact on the fireflies. You can leave your grass, part of your grass long. Another excuse not to mow the line. Yes, no mo may.

No mo may can extend the entire summer. We have an initiative called Lights Out for Lightning Bugs, which is for a period of time in the summer, you actually turn off your lights during firefly mating period. And we actually encourage folks to go out and just sit out and enjoy the light show. Okay, so what I'm hearing is that you shouldn't mow the lawn. Trees are great. Darkness is great.

What about stuff like pesticides if I use pesticides on my lawn? We are recommending trying to use very specific chemicals, so not broad spectrum of insecticides. And in fact, if you cannot spray at all, that would be the best practice. However, if you're thinking of like using some organic methods, things like using BT, bacillus thyrngensis, which is a bacterial insecticide that can be very specific to a particular insect that you're targeting, that might be the safest way to go. So you've been talking about firefly species, and I think I always assumed it was just one animal. So tell me about some of these different species. Do you have a favorite firefly?

There are over 2,400 described species of firefly around the world. Wow. And in North America alone, There's probably over 180 now. Just last month, a description of three new species on the East Coast just showed up. So we are still discovering new species. My favorite species is the Blue Ghost Firefly. So this is a firefly that you can find in the Smoky Mountains. I recently heard of populations starting to appear up the Appalachian range.

And this is a species that glows. So it doesn't flash. It actually sustains its glow and it sort of floats around in the forest. It looks like fairy lights. Is it possible for, you know, a normal person, me to tell fireflies apart by eye? Is that something I could learn how to do? You could totally learn how to do that. Part of the training for Firefly Atlas includes some informational videos on how to identify different species. You can look at their flash patterns.

So each species emits its own pattern of flashes. And so you can tell species in that way. Different species can be different colors. They signal in different habitats at different times of night. And so some of the trainings for that include documenting that information. So that even if you don't know what the species is, we can go back in later and say, this is likely this particular species given this data. So maybe if you're a birder and that's gotten a little old, you're looking for something new.

maybe firefly species identifier is your next hobby. I don't know. I understand that this is fieldwork season for you. So what does that look like as a firefly scientist? Fieldwork for a firefly scientist is like the best day ever. It's also one of the longest days ever. So you are going out in the field. You take your net. You take your hat to prevent getting spider webs in the face. You take your headlamp, you have your stopwatch to time flashes. You have lots and lots of things to keep fireflies in. So instead of big heavy mason jars, we actually have little plastic tubes that we're using to catch them and look at them closely. And you go out about 30 minutes before sunset to explore your sight. And once it starts getting dark,

frog start coming out, cricket start coming out, and then the fireflies. And it's just a kid in a candy store is not quite the right analogy, but it is amazing. Most people think of fireflies coming out at night or at sunset with those beautiful biluminousant flashes, but actually many species have lost the ability to light up as adults, and instead they come out during the day. They do not emit light, and we think that they might be using pheromones to communicate. And so my fieldwork also involves going out. in the daytime and collecting fireflies. So we are on at 8 a.m., 9 a.m. and we go all the way up to 10, 11 at night.

Wow, that's a long day. I understand that you frequent firefly festivals. I don't think I've ever heard of a firefly festival. There are firefly festivals around the world. There is one near us, near Bucknell University in Pennsylvania, the Pennsylvania Firefly Festival. It is every June, towards the end of June, and it coincides with the emergence of the synchronizing firefly, Fatinus Carolinas. So this is a firefly that emerges and will actually sink up its flashes so that you have the whole section of forest pulsing together. It's most well known from the Smoky Mountains. So there is a lottery system now to get tickets to go and see the annual emergence of Fatinus Carolinas down there. It is absolutely phenomenal.

if you get a chance, definitely do it. But we also have them, they go up the mountain range, and we also have them in Pennsylvania in Allegheny National Forest. That sounds like quite a show. Dr. Sarah Lauer, assistant professor of biology at Bucknell University. Thanks for taking time to talk with me today. Thank you so much for having me. That's it for today.

Lots of folks help make the show happen this week, including Dee Petersman, Sandy Roberts, F. Rami, John Dancosky, and many more. Tomorrow, we'll check in on the week's News and Science. I'm sci-fi producer Charles Burquist. Thanks for listening. We'll see you soon.