Ticks Can Live to be 27 Years Old, Even After Eight Years of Starvation

If you grew up checking under your waistband and behind your ears for ticks after a romp outside, you may want to sit down: ticks have been found to have much longer lifespans than previously suspected, even after extended periods of starvation.

Julian Shepherd, a biologist and associate professor at Binghamton University in New York, recently recorded the longest known tick lifespan after keeping a few of the critters at his lab. Shepherd had received 13 Argus Brumpti (a species of soft tick native to arid eastern and southern Africa) as a gift back in 1976 and elected to build them a stable habitat he could use to conduct studies. Shepherd fed the ticks mice, rats, and lab rabbits until 1984, when he made the decision to take their sustenance away.

In multiple ways, the ticks’ survival abilities surprised Shepherd. All four male ticks lived for four years without food, while all six females lived for eight. The biologist chose to feed the survivors again at this point, leading to his next shock: one of the female ticks laid a batch of eggs, a feat previously assumed to be impossible considering her male counterparts had been out of the picture for four years. Shepherd believes this strange reproductive skill is due in part to female ticks’ ability to store sperm for extended periods of time, as ticks are typically incapable of asexual reproduction.

“The longevity of these ticks is apparently a record for any species of tick,” Shepherd wrote in his study, which was published in the December 2021 issue of the Journal of Medical Entomology. “The delay in reproduction likely represents long-term storage of viable sperm, also apparently a record for any species of tick.”

Though not to the extent that cockroaches are, ticks are known for their impressive (albeit off-putting) ability to endure harsh conditions. But survival in the face of long-term food deprivation is something very few species can accomplish. The longest-surviving of Shepherd’s original ticks lived to be 27 years old, despite the period of severe malnutrition they endured mid-life. Their offspring are being sent to South Africa, where scientists will conduct further testing on how A. Brumpti manage to “master such challenges” as long-term starvation.

Feature image by Wikimedia Commons, Jerry Kirkhart, CC BY 2.0