Montana
Deer ticks, Lyme disease carriers, found in Montana
Laura Lundquist
(Missoula Current) Montana appears to have a new invasive species, and this one could come with a few nasty parasites.
The Montana Department of Public Health and Human Services announced last week that three blacklegged ticks, also called deer ticks, have been found in eastern Montana over the past year. While the ticks aren’t necessarily pleasant, the real problem is that they’re known to carry Lyme disease, in addition to several other parasites that can infect people and animals.
The first blacklegged tick was found in Dawson County around Glendive earlier in 2024. A man found the tick on his hunting dog and sent it to the Montana State University Extension’s Schutter Diagnostic Lab, where diagnostician Marni Rolston identified it. Rolston collaborated with scientists at the National Institutes of Health’s Rocky Mountain Laboratory in Hamilton to confirm the identification.
“This discovery is incredibly important because it greatly expands the geographic range of the blacklegged tick, a carrier of the pathogen that causes Lyme Disease,” said Bob Peterson, an MSU entomologist in a release. “The implications of finding this tick in Montana cannot be overstated.”
In the fall of 2024, two more ticks were found in Sheridan County in far northeast Montana, an area popular for bird hunting, and DPHHS, along with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, confirmed they were blacklegged ticks.
The percentage of blacklegged ticks that are infected with Lyme disease ranges from none to more than 50% of a population, depending on the area and life stage. Lyme disease infection occurs mostly in the northeastern, mid-Atlantic, and north-central United States, according to the CDC. Blacklegged ticks found in most areas of the southeastern United States are almost never infected.
Lyme disease can produce a wide range of symptoms, depending on the stage of infection. These include fever, rash, facial paralysis, an irregular heartbeat and arthritis.
No pathogens were found on the ticks in Montana, according to the DPHHS. But their presence means Montanans should be alert, particularly in Dawson and Sheridan counties, said Devon Cozart, DPHHS vector-borne disease epidemiologist.
“The presence of this new type of tick in the state could mean that Montanans have an increased risk of exposure to diseases that weren’t previously a threat in Montana,” Cozart said in a release. “These ticks could have been carried into the state by a host animal, or they could be active and reproducing here – we just don’t know yet. We will be conducting further investigations this spring.”
Blacklegged ticks are not native to Montana. Research indicates they survived the Ice Age in the southeastern U.S. and then steadily expanded northward during the 20th century, spurred by reforestation, a warming climate and animal hosts moving north. In addition, blacklegged ticks have subsequently been spreading west, followed by the lone star tick.
Research has shown that several species can serve as migration vectors for ticks, including deer and migratory birds. People can also factor in, because they move animals around, including horses and dogs. In recent years, the number of nonresidents using eastern Montana to train their dogs in the winter and hunt in the fall has surged. Just like ticks can be carried into your house, one or two ticks could hitch rides to Montana on nonresident dogs from the hotbeds of Minnesota, Iowa and Wisconsin.
If anything, dog owners should be concerned because pets can get Lyme disease too. In most cases, a tick must be attached for more than 24 hours before the Lyme disease bacterium can be transmitted, according to the CDC. If you remove a tick within 24 hours, you can greatly reduce the chances of you or your pets getting Lyme disease.
According to the CDC, the established populations currently closest to Montana are in the eastern portions of the Dakotas and throughout Minnesota. A November 2023 CDC scientific review concluded that, because black-legged ticks have established in counties in the far eastern parts of Nebraska and the Dakotas, “it is reasonable to assume that (blacklegged ticks) invaded in recent decades from the eastern neighboring states of Minnesota and Iowa.”
The map showing tick presence could change to include Montana if researchers find more ticks. To that end, DPHHS is launching a citizen-scientist program and is requesting the public’s help in tick surveillance, especially in Dawson and Sheridan counties. Anyone who thinks they have found a blacklegged tick is encouraged to fill out this online form.
Montana is home to the Rocky Mountain wood tick and the American dog tick, which can also spread diseases such as Rocky Mountain spotted fever and Colorado tick fever. These ticks tend to be brown and are much larger than the dark-red deer tick.
Contact reporter Laura Lundquist at lundquist@missoulacurrent.com.
Everyone makes mistakes, even experienced professionals; a good reminder for the rest of us to learn from those mistakes. The motion in State v. Stroup starts off well in its initial pages (no case law hallucinations), but is then followed by several pages of two other motions, which I don’t think the lawyer was planning to file, and which appear to have been AI-generated: It begins with the “Below is concise motion language you can drop into …” language quoted above.
Griffen Smith (Missoulian) reported on the story, and included the prosecutor’s motion to strike that filing, on the grounds that it violates a local rule (3(G)) requiring disclosure of the use of generative AI:
The document does not include a generative artificial intelligence disclosure as required. However, page 7 begins as follows: “Below is concise motion language you can drop into a ‘Motion to Admit Mental-Disease Evidence and for Related Instructions’ keyed to 45-6-204, 45-6-201, and 4614-102. Adjust headings/captions to your local practice.” Page 10 states “Below is a full motion you can paste into your pleading, then adjust names, dates, and styles to fit local practice.” These pages also include several apparent hyperlinks to “ppl-ai-file-upload.s3.amazonaws,” “ppl-ai-fileupload.s3.amazonaws+1,” and others. The document includes what appears to be an attempt at a second case caption on page 12. It is not plausible on its face that any source other than generative AI would have created such language for a filed version of a brief….
There’s more in that filing, but here’s one passage:
While generative AI can be a useful tool for some purposes and may have greater application in the future, when used improperly, and without meaningful review, it can ultimately damage both the perception and the reality of the profession. One assumes that Mr. Stroup has had, or will at some point have, an opportunity to review the filing made on his behalf. What impression could a review of pgs. 12-19 leave upon a defendant who struggles with paranoia and delusional thinking? While AI could theoretically one day become a replacement for portions of staff of experienced attorneys, it is readily apparent that this day has not yet arrived.
The Missoulan article includes this response:
In a Wednesday interview, Office of Public Defender Division Administrator Brian Smith told the Missoulian the AI-generated language was inadvertently included in an unrelated filing. And he criticized the county attorney’s office for filing a “four-page diatribe about the dangers of AI” instead of working with the defense to correct her mistake.
“That’s not helping the client or the case,” Smith said, “and all you are doing is trying to throw a professional colleague under the bus.”
As I mentioned, the lawyer involved seems quite experienced, and ran for the Montana Public Service Commission in 2020 (getting nearly 48% of the vote) and for the House of Representatives in Montana’s first district in 2022 (getting over 46% of the vote) and in 2024 (getting over 44%). “Его пример другим наука,” Pushkin wrote in Eugene Onegin—”May his example profit others,” in the Falen translation.
Thanks to Matthew Monforton for the pointer.
HELENA — You probably have goals and plans for 2026—the Montana Department of Agriculture does too.
“We’re really focusing on innovative agricultural practices,” Montana Department of Agriculture director Jillien Streit said.
It’s no secret that agriculture—farming and ranching—is not easy. There are long days, planning, monitoring crops and livestock, and other challenges beyond farmers’ and ranchers’ control.
(WATCH: Montana Department of Agriculture focusing on innovation in 2026)
Montana Department of Agriculture focusing on innovation in 2026
“We have very low commodity prices across the board,” Streit said. “We still have very high input prices across the board, and we have really high prices when it comes to our equipment, and so, it’s a really tough year.”
But innovation, including new practices, partnerships and technology use, can help navigate some of those challenges.
“We can’t make more time and we can’t make more land, so we need to start putting together innovative practices that help us maximize what our time and land can do,” Streit said.
Practices range from using technology like autonomous tractors and virtual fencing—allowing rangers to contain and move cattle right from their phones—to regenerative farming and ranching.
“It is bringing cattle back into farming operations to be able to work with cover cropping practices to invigorate the soil for new soil health benefits,” Streit said.
The Montana Department of Agriculture is working to help producers learn, share, and collaborate on new ideas to work in their operations.
The department will share stories of practices that work from farms and ranches across the state. Also, within the next year or so, Streit said the department is hoping to roll out technology to help producers collaborate.
“(It’s) providing a communication platform where people can get together and really help each other out by utilizing each other’s assets,” she said.
While not easy, agriculture is still one of Montana’s largest industries, and Streit said innovating and sharing ideas across the state can keep it going long into the future.
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