Don’t flush ticks down the toilet
Popular Science...
Tick season is in full swing—and it could be a doozy. A wet winter in large swaths of the United States means that many of the dreaded disease-carrying insects survived the season tucked into the snowpack. And now the parasites that love our lawns ready to feast on animal blood.
There are a lot of myths about ticks, including that they can jump from trees and that keeping an opossum as a pet will keep them at bay. Another that pops up is that flushing a tick down the toilet is a good way to kill it. Unfortunately, that does not work.
“Typically, when you flush something, it’s out of sight out of mind, so you think it’s dead,” Cornell University entomologist Brian Lovett tells Popular Science. “A tick will not die if you flush it.”
Ticks can survive the force of the flushing water, and they can also float in the toilet water and return.
“They could absolutely crawl up the porcelain. I think that’s unlikely, but that absolutely could happen as well,” says Lovett.
Ticks’ bodies are like inflated balloons, but instead of being made of rubber, they are covered with a tough leathery exoskeleton made of chitin. This exterior makes them difficult to squish and helps keep them alive in water and under extreme conditions. Depending on the species, ticks can go anywhere from a few days to even years without eating, meaning that they can simply wait out a blood host with few consequences. Once they do find that host, they can firmly latch on to its body and remain attached for days if left alone.
“They are basically like a small little impervious tank, and so that presents a real challenge for control.” says Lovett.
Another reason to not flush ticks down has to do with data. If possible, you should try and trap the tick in a pill bottle, plastic bag, or other secure container and send it to a university or local health department for testing. The personnel there will provide further instructions on what to do with the specimen, whether freezing it or preserving it in rubbing alcohol.
“You just want to interact with that tick as minimally as possible,” Lovett says.
Scientists can then use the specimen to identify which of the roughly 900 known tick species it is and could see if it is carrying any tick-borne illness like Lyme disease. Taking a closer look could also help in future tick studies, as scientists race to understand the risks they pose and the diseases they carry.
“We are trying to catch up to ticks,” Lovett explains. “So when you’re flushing that tick down the toilet, you’re flushing all that data down the toilet. And that data might be able to protect you and your neighbors.”
Some organizations to reach out to if you would like to donate a tick include BeBop Labs in Massachusetts, the State University of New York’s (SUNY) Upstate Tick Testing Laboratory, the Tick Research Lab of Pennsylvania, the Midwest Center of Excellence for Vector-Borne Disease at the University of Wisconsin, Ticknology in Colorado, and BiTeRS in California and Arizona.
If you prefer to just kill the tick, smush it very hard in a tissue or a piece of tape, pierce it with a needle, or submerge it in ethanol.
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