We don't have ticks, do we?
That's exactly how many of us think. But we are very much mistaken. All of us who have a cat or dog at home can always get out the tick tweezers sooner. Even in areas where there were none before.

From 2009 to 2012, the infectiologist Dr. Gernot Walder, as part of the Interreg project VEIT, with the help of hunters and foresters, surveyed the spread of ticks and the pathogens they transmit across the European region of Tyrol for the first time.
However, the activity of ticks is still barely recorded. After mosquitoes, they are the most common parasites in the Alpine region - and of all the parasites, they are the ones that most often transmit diseases. We do not know whether and in which areas they are active and to what extent. This makes any precautionary measures difficult.

THE GOAL
Hardly anyone knows the activity of ticks better than hunters: they find them on hunted game, on hunting dogs and are themselves among the main risk groups for tick bites.

That's why Dr. Gernot Walder in Ausservillgraten (East Tyrol), the South Tyrolean hunting association, a group of veterinary doctors (ULLS1) from Belluno and the Tyrolean hunters' association have set the goal of reducing the activity of ticks across the board in the province of Belluno, South Tyrolean Pustertal (Province of Bozen ) and East Tyrol and to set up an appropriate monitoring system. If proven successful, this can be expanded to other areas.

The aim of this project is to record the activity of ticks in a long-term and reproducible manner in order to develop predictive models, quickly detect the introduction of new species and record geographical spreads.

THE IMPLEMENTATION
This project goal can be achieved if as many hunters as possible record the tick infestation on hunted game and on their own dogs and enter this data into a common database using an app.

The following data is collected and transmitted:
•⁠ ⁠the number of ticks found
•⁠ ⁠GPS location of the hunted game (altitude above sea level)
•⁠ ⁠Type of game

If you are stung yourself, you can and should report it so that the activity on game can be correlated with the risk of stings in humans.

The data entered forms the basis for research and monitoring. The hunters who take part subsequently gain insight into the project and can also observe tick activity in the monitored regions themselves.