How to get rid of ticks in your yard

Mow your lawn often and remove leaf litter around your house and lawn edges. Then lay a 3-foot barrier of wood chips or gravel between the lawn and any wooded area. These steps do the most to cut the tick population in your yard. Evidence backs the litter and vegetation work especially well (CDC, Harvard Health).

Why your own yard matters

Many people pick up ticks at home, since ticks live in grassy, brushy, and wooded places and even on animals (CDC). Ticks favor moist, shady areas, so expect them where your yard stays damp and shaded (Harvard Health). Black-legged ticks can pass on the Lyme disease bacteria, and it takes one bite to get infected.

Ticks ride in on animal hosts, and white-footed mice are a key source of the Lyme bacteria they carry. Adult female ticks feed on deer and then drop into yards to lay eggs. Birds can carry ticks from one yard to another (Harvard Health).

More yard work that reduces ticks

Keep in mind that the evidence for the wood chip barrier is weaker than for litter removal (Harvard Health).

A few more steps cut the hiding places and food sources ticks rely on:

• Stack firewood neatly and keep it dry to discourage rodents.
• Keep playground equipment away from yard edges and trees.
• Remove old furniture, mattresses, or trash from the yard where ticks can hide.

Spraying for ticks, and its limits

Pesticides that kill ticks (called acaricides) can reduce tick numbers in treated areas. But spraying alone should not be your plan, since studies have not shown it lowers human infection risk (CDC, Harvard Health).

If you spray, timing counts. One application in May or early June, when young nymph ticks are out, matters most. A second spray in fall helps against adults. A well-timed spray can reduce yard ticks for six to eight weeks (Harvard Health). Windy or rainy weather reduces spray coverage, so pick a calm, dry day.

Choose a product registered by the EPA and your state pesticide agency. Make sure it targets black-legged ticks, since some products kill only dog ticks, which do not carry Lyme disease. Liquids work somewhat better than granules. Products come as premixed sprays, concentrates, and dry granules.

Before you spray, check with local health or agricultural officials about timing, product type, and local rules.

Follow the label on safety. EPA-registered pesticides used as directed are unlikely to cause serious health problems in children and pregnant women. But keep children and pets off treated areas until the spray dries, usually 12 to 24 hours (Harvard Health).

Tick tubes are worth a try, with caveats

Tick tubes are long tubes holding permethrin-soaked cotton. Mice carry the cotton back to their nests, and the permethrin kills ticks feeding on them. You can buy tick tubes at hardware and home and garden stores (Harvard Health).

Research on tick tubes has shown mixed results, possibly because placement location and timing matter. Sprays and landscaping work together, so pair any tube use with the mowing and litter steps above.

Start this weekend by raking leaf litter out from the lawn edges and around your foundation, then mow.