Fig 1.
Examples of increasing levels of eastern redcedar encroachment into grasslands in Oklahoma, USA.
Table 1.
Specific land cover categories from the Oklahoma Ecological Systems Mapping (OESM) data layer (Diamond et al. 2015) used to identify areas in western and central Oklahoma, USA with open grasslands (which we considered to be our control treatment), and varying stages of eastern redcedar encroachment.
Fig 2.
Map of seven site clusters across central and western Oklahoma in which ticks were sampled to study the effect of woody plant encroachment by eastern redcedar on abundance of three tick species.
Sites included: 1) Boiling Springs State Park, 2) Canton Wildlife Management Area, 3) American Horse Lake, 4) Fort Cobb State Park West, 5) Fort Cobb State Park East, 6) Lake Carl Blackwell, 7) Oklahoma State University Research Range.
Table 2.
Total count (mean + /- SE) of field-collected ticks sampled by site, stage, species, and life stage at seven site clusters and 28 sites capturing open grasslands and three stages of intensifying eastern redcedar encroachment (respectively labelled in the table as open grasslands, early ERC, moderate ERC, and mature ERC) across central and western Oklahoma, USA, July 2022-June 2024.
Fig 3.
Comparison of mean abundances of: (a) A. americanum adults collected from CO2 traps, (b) A. americanum adults collected from flags, (c) A. americanum nymphs collected from CO2 traps, (d) A. americanum nymphs collected from flags, among sites capturing open grasslands, early eastern redcedar (ERC), moderate ERC, and mature ERC.
Whiskers represent standard errors, letters shared among stages indicate no significant differences among them, and stages with different letters indicate significant differences among them.
Fig 4.
Comparison of mean abundance of D. variabilis among sites capturing open grasslands, early eastern redcedar (ERC), moderate ERC, and mature ERC.
Whiskers represent standard errors, letters shared among stages indicate no significant differences among them, and stages with different letters indicate significant differences among them.
Fig 5.
Comparison of mean abundance of A. maculatum among sites capturing open grasslands, early eastern redcedar (ERC), moderate ERC, and mature ERC.
Whiskers represent standard errors, letters shared among stages indicate no significant differences among them, and stages with different letters indicate significant differences among them.