In early July, 1863, troops from General Robert E. Leeâs Army of Northern Virginia (the Confederates) met up with a patrol of Union cavalry on the outskirts of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. Over the next three days, this encounter grew into a turning point of the Civil War.
In the South, lone star ticks (Amblyomma americanum) can also transmit Lyme disease or a closely related illness. Ticks have four life stages: egg, larva, nymph and adult. In each stage after hatching, they suck blood from animals like mice, squirrels, birds and deer.
Lone star ticks have not been shown to transmit Borrelia burgdorferi, the cause of Lyme disease. In fact, their saliva has been shown to kill Borrelia (Ledin et al., 2005, Zeidner et al., 2009). The lone star tick, Amblyomma americanum, is found throughout the eastern, southeastern and south-central states.