Ticks and Mites 



27 



than anything else (Fig. 14). This resemblance is 

 responsible for some of the popular names, such as 

 "castor-bean tick," etc. 



The legs of most species are comparatively short, 

 and the head is small so that they are often hardly 

 noticeable when the body is distended. The suck- 

 ing beak which is thrust into the host when the 

 tick is feeding is furnished with many strong re- 

 curved teeth which hold on so firmly that when one 

 attempts to pull the tick away the head is often 

 torn from the body and left in the skin. Unless 

 care is taken to remove this, serious sores often 

 result. 



Ticks are wholly parasitic in their habits. Some 

 of them live on their host practically all their lives, 

 dropping to the ground to deposit their eggs when 

 fully mature. Others leave their host twice to 

 molt in or on the ground. The female lays her 

 eggs, 1,000 to 10,000 of them, on the ground or just 

 beneath the surface. The young "seed-ticks " that 

 hatch from these in a few days soon crawl up on 

 some near-by blade of grass or on a bush or shrub 

 and wait quietly and patiently until some animal 

 comes along. If the animal comes close enough 

 they leave the grass or other support and cling to 

 their new-found host and are soon taking their first 

 meal. Of course thousands of them are disap- 



