Monhegan Island in Maine had a one-time hunt in the mid-1990s to eliminate the deer population (deer had been introduced in 1955 and Lyme disease had become prevalent, with 13% of the island's residents infected). Five years later new cases of Lyme had been greatly reduced). Similar results have been reported elsewhere (http://www.deeralliance.com/node/10).

With 32 million deer in the U.S. and virtually no predators, the obvious approach to controlling the spread of tick borne diseases is to reduce the number of deer.

They're beautiful animals, but like with any other species, including humans, there's such a thing as too many.

Agreed.

I live rural and to me deer are a pest. I do not want them traipsing through my property and not really because of the damage they do to my plants but because of the tick issue.

As we have removed the deer's natural predators it is our job now to manage their population in absence of those predators. Lyme disease is one example of how we have failed to do that adequately.

Another thing we have done to make Lyme disease prevalent is make the fox a rare species. Part of the tick's complicated lifecycle involves mice, and mice and vole populations explode in the absence of foxes. Having a healthy fox population helps to keep the population of mice down, which can interrupt the lifecycle of the tick.

We need an active deer hunt, reintroduction of wolves in places, and a program to encourage foxes. Coyotes won't do much to suppress the population of mice.

Yes, we need more foxes! Actually I saw one the other night around here (suburban town near Boston); that makes me happy.

Snakes eat mice, too. People in the Northeast have eradicated many native snakes such as the Northeast timber rattler. We should reintroduce them, and this will cut into the tick's life cycle.

For example, the hills around Almaden Valley and Santa Cruz mountain foothills are full of deer which are known positive carriers of Lyme Disease. In the 1990's, there were or are signs on the trails indicating this. I believe the same caution applies to hills extending towards San Francisco, which includes walking The Dish at Stanford.

Needless to say: wear long socks and have someone else completely check all of your limbs and back under bright light and magnification for those very tiny deer ticks.

Agree. Is a disease of the environment. Deer kill much more people than predators (ticks, car accidents) but people are not afraid of herbivores. In not urban areas, a few well managed packs of wolves could be our best option. It seems that there is not much Lyme disease cases in the places having wolves.

So it seems that we need to make a choice about what would be worst, to lost some unattended cattle sometimes and be afraid of wolves or living with the fear of Lyme, crop damage and coyotes. If we can live with coyotes in the backyard maybe we could get an acceptable point of tolerance with wolves that avoid humans much more than coyotes do.

Along with the deer population, controlling the rampant spread of Japanese Barberry - an invasive species becoming very common here in the Northeast - can help control the tick population:

http://today.uconn.edu/2012/02/controlling-japanese-barberry...