D3400: Monitoring of hard tick population from 2019 to 2022 in Andong, Gyeongbuk province, South Korea

In order to investigate hard tick population, we collected ticks once a month from April to November in four different environments (grassland, mountain path, grave, and copse) using CO2 bait traps for four years (2019 – 2022) in Andong, Gyeongbuk province, South Korea. The nymph and adult stages of collected ticks were identified morphologically, while molecular biological technique was applied for larva identification. According to the morphological/molecular identification, Haemaphysalis longicornis was the dominant species, accounting for 88.4% of the total, followed by H. flava at 10.6%, and Ixodes nipponensis at 0.7%. H. longicornis was predominantly collected during the spring to early summer period, whereas H. flava was mainly collected in spring and autumn, suggesting slightly different preference for season between two species. Monthly tick population analysis revealed that the highest numbers of nymph, adult, and larva were collected in April, June, and August, respectively, indicating population peaks depending on the sequence of developmental stages. In the SFTS virus detection, SFTS virus fragments were amplified in 5.56% pools for four 4 years.