Ticks and the illnesses they spread are on the rise because Rock Creek Park is being allowed and seemingly encouraged to return to a primitive wilderness thicket instead of being a parkland for people to enjoy. MNCPPC seems to want more deer and other animals to multiply, infect people, and run into traffic instead of paying for mowing so that its parks can actually be parks for people.
When times were simpler, MNCPPC kept Rock Creek as a park for people to play and picnic throughout its narrow length through urban and suburban MoCo. The strategy was to perform regular mowing, and maintain many more picnic tables than you can find today.
Now we have increasing cries for vaccine research for Lyme disease. This disease can be easily preventable were MoCo, and other places, practicing true environmentalism and facilitating harmonious people-nature interaction. Instead, MNCPPC is allowing nature to run wild, like a panicked deer, in what were supposed to be for parks for people. A well maintained park should be an amenity for us humans, not an incubator for spreading Lyme disease that can be a lifelong debilitation.
Lyme disease, transmitted from a tick bite, can sap all the pleasure out of an infected human’s life. Deer can thrive in big forests, not narrow parks. There is now an additional problem with deer-wasting disease due to their multiplication in an environment lacking historical predators. Who knows, under current MNCPPC “policies” we may soon be over-run by foxes, coyotes and wolves.
Ticks carry Lyme disease, and deer are hosts for ticks. Deer go everywhere in MoCo, eating everything they can find. Deer are victims in dangerous roadway collisions where people too get hurt. If we had sensible environmentalism, we would selectively harvest mature trees throughout Rock Creek Park. By mowing we can maintain tree spacing for straighter, better lumber—in turn providing an inventory of locally sourced wood for construction. Mowing also provides larger picnic and play areas and far fewer ticks.
Illogic and ever unfulfilled promises is what our current MoCo salary and benefits collecting politicians are masters at. May Clean Slate MoCo assemble a slate of leaders who make us more than sources of blood for ticks.
For additional information, see the following resources.
Ticks in Maryland (University of Maryland Extension)
Feds Now Have New Surge in CDC Funds (Senator Chuck Schumer, New York)
Maryland survey reports 62 CWD-positive deer in 2024 (University of Minnesota)
Senator Collins Questions Top Health Officials on Tick-Borne Diseases (Senator Susan Collins, Maine)
Related posts:
Deer Tick Politick
CM Evan Glass Proposes “Anti-Hate” Task Force, But Then What is MoCo’s Committee on “Hate / Violence” Really Doing?
Ironic Turn of Events: M-NCPPC, Which Once Fined a Local Man for Foraging Berries in a Park, Now Promotes Events Like “Foraging 2.0” and “Outdoor Skills: Shelter Building for Women & Non-Binary Individuals