Birds may expand the range of Lyme disease and its vector tick
Lyme disease (Borrelia burgdorferi) is typically associated with mammals, but birds too can become infected by black-legged ticks (Ixodes scapularis), the principal vector of the pathogen. Moreover, birds may figure significantly in the range expansion of both the Lyme bacterium and black-legged ticks. So say Jory Brinkerhoff and colleagues of Yale University in a paper published today in Frontiers in…