Paralysis Tick Season

Paralysis ticks are present all year in Cairns, but numbers of ticks (and thus tick paralysis cases) peak from June to December each year. This roughly correlates to our dry season. In 2010 our normal dry season was marked by frequent rain periods and we saw less ticks than normal.

In fact if you plot tick paralysis cases against rainfall you see a clear inverse relationship (See below)

Having said that, tick cases often follow a shower: the classic situation is to see tick cases a few days to a week after a shower during a dry period.