Page Comparison - Canyon Creek Schoolhouse Laboratory 100th Anniversary Mission (v.51 vs v.52)

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The life cycle of the tick: a fertilized female lays thousands of eggs on the ground. When they hatch as larvae, they attach to small animals and feed. Then they drop off to digest their meal, and molt (shed their old shell) to become nymphs. The first winter they spend as unfed nymphs.

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In spring, the nymphs once again attach to an animal and feed, drop to the ground, and digest their meals. This time they molt to adults, like these Rocky Mountain wood ticks, Dermacentor andersoni. They spend their second winter as unfed adults.

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The next spring they climb grass and bushes to attach to animals.

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But as adults, ticks mate as well as feed. This is when the ticks can get the Rickettsia rickettsii bacteria from the animals they feed on. Even though the bacteria don’t hurt the ticks, it infects all of their cells, and is passed on through the egg. The next generation of ticks will be infected.

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Images: Office of NIH History and Stetten Museum, 1554-58

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Environmental studies

To understand the entire picture of RMSF transmission, the entomologists at the Canyon Creek Schoolhouse laboratory began environmental studies of the relationships between the distribution of vegetation, rodents, ticks, and humans.

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“Valuable Experiment: Please Do Not Disturb” reads a sign put up in 1928 by one of the RMSF researchers in one area undergoing an ecological study.

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Image: Office of NIH History and Stetten Museum, 1479

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As RMSF gave up its mysteries, researchers still had other tick-borne diseases to study. They constantly collected ticks where outbreaks of Rickettsial diseases occurred.

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In 1929, LeRoy Jones, Harley G. Sargent, Harry L. Sargent, and James Kerlee posed at the top of Blodgett Canyon in the Bitterroot Range. Each holds several white cloth bundles tied to a stick for specimen collection. James Kerlee’s brother, Arthur LeRoy Kerlee, had died the year before of RMSF that he had acquired in the laboratory.

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In a world filled with ticks and the diseases they carry—and diseases that have similar symptoms—being able to diagnose a disease quickly might be beneficial for treatment or for clues to how to control it. The classic feature of RMSF, the rash, appears days after the initial infection. The other symptoms can be confused with diseases such as typhus.

In 1916, the Weil-Felix reaction was developed to diagnose epidemic typhus. In 1928, LeRoy Kerlee and Dr. Roscoe Spencer did their own tests on guinea pigs, rabbits, and people at the Canyon Creek Schoolhouse laboratory. They reported that the Weil-Felix reaction could diagnose RMSF. The test became widely used to diagnose many Rickettsial diseases; although it has been replaced by newer diagnostic techniques such as indirect immunofluorescence, it can be useful in parts of the world without access to such technology.

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Overlooking Hamilton, Montana, where the Canyon Creek Schoolhouse laboratory was located. How many ticks were on those hills?

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Image: Office of NIH History and Stetten Museum, 1562-3

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Versions Compared

Old Version 51

New Version 52

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Environmental studies

Office of NIH History and Stetten Museum