New Mexico is home to several tick species that can transmit serious diseases, including Rocky Mountain spotted fever and tick-borne relapsing fever. The state ranks among the highest-incidence states in the country for spotted fever infections. Whether you’re hiking in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains, camping in the Gila, or just spending time in your backyard, knowing which ticks live here and what risks they carry is worth your time.
Hard Ticks in New Mexico
The ticks most people picture, the flat, teardrop-shaped ones that latch on and feed for hours or days, are called hard ticks. New Mexico has three hard tick species of medical concern. The wood tick (also called the Rocky Mountain wood tick) lives in brushy, higher-elevation areas across the western United States. The American dog tick is common in grasslands and along trails. The brown dog tick, unlike most species, can survive indoors and frequently infests homes and kennels where dogs are present.
All three of these species can transmit spotted fever group rickettsioses, a category of bacterial infections that includes Rocky Mountain spotted fever. Despite its name, Rocky Mountain spotted fever is not limited to the Rockies. New Mexico is one of seven states with the highest incidence in the country, alongside North Carolina, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Tennessee, Missouri, and Arizona.
Soft Ticks and Relapsing Fever
New Mexico also has a lesser-known tick threat: soft ticks in the genus Ornithodoros. These ticks look and behave very differently from hard ticks. They don’t hang out in tall grass waiting to grab a passing hiker. Instead, they live inside rodent burrows and nests, often in and around rustic cabins, caves, or crawl spaces where mice and other rodents have been active.
Soft ticks feed fast, typically less than 30 minutes, and they bite at night. The bites are painless, so most people never realize they’ve been bitten. The species found at lower elevations across the Southwest, Ornithodoros turicata, is the primary vector in New Mexico’s desert and scrubland environments. A related species, Ornithodoros hermsi, lives at higher elevations in coniferous forests, usually between 1,500 and 8,000 feet.
These ticks transmit tick-borne relapsing fever, a bacterial infection caused by Borrelia species. Once a soft tick picks up the bacteria from an infected rodent, it stays infectious for the rest of its life, which can be up to 10 years. The ticks prefer rodent blood, but if rodents leave or die off, they’ll readily bite humans instead. This is why people staying in old, rodent-inhabited cabins are at particular risk.
What Relapsing Fever Feels Like
Tick-borne relapsing fever has a distinctive pattern. You develop a high fever that lasts two to seven days, followed by a stretch of four to 14 days where you feel better. Then the fever returns. Without treatment, this cycle can repeat for weeks. The recurring nature of the illness is what gives it its name, and it’s also the clue that helps doctors recognize it. Untreated relapsing fever can cause serious complications, including pregnancy loss. It responds well to antibiotics when caught, but the tricky part is connecting the symptoms to a tick bite that you likely never felt.
Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever Symptoms
Rocky Mountain spotted fever is the more dangerous of New Mexico’s tick-borne diseases. Early symptoms typically appear within a week or two of a bite and include fever, headache, muscle aches, and fatigue. A rash often develops, though it doesn’t always appear in the classic spotted pattern that gives the disease its name. Without prompt antibiotic treatment, the infection can damage blood vessels throughout the body and become life-threatening. If you develop a sudden fever with severe headache after spending time outdoors in tick habitat, mention the possibility of tick exposure to your doctor, even if you don’t remember a bite.
Where You’re Most Likely to Encounter Ticks
Hard ticks in New Mexico tend to be most active from spring through early fall. You’ll find them in areas with brush, tall grass, and leaf litter, particularly along trails, forest edges, and anywhere deer and other wildlife travel. The brown dog tick breaks this pattern by thriving in drier, developed environments. It’s the species most likely to infest a home or yard, especially if dogs go in and out regularly.
Soft tick encounters are more situational. The classic scenario is staying overnight in a mountain cabin that has had rodent activity, sleeping in or near a cave, or working in crawl spaces or outbuildings where rodents nest. Because soft ticks feed at night and leave quickly, people often wake up with bites they can’t explain.
How to Remove a Tick
If you find a hard tick attached to your skin, grab it with fine-tipped tweezers as close to the skin surface as possible. Pull straight up with steady, even pressure. Don’t twist, jerk, or squeeze the tick’s body. The goal is to remove the entire tick in one piece, including the mouthparts embedded in your skin. After removal, clean the bite area and your hands with rubbing alcohol or soap and water. Never crush a tick with your bare fingers.
Soft tick bites are harder to manage because you rarely catch the tick in the act. If you’re staying in a cabin or structure with signs of rodent activity in New Mexico, sleeping away from walls and off the floor reduces your risk. Sealing rodent entry points and removing nesting material is the most effective long-term prevention.
Reducing Your Risk Outdoors
When hiking or working in tick habitat, wearing long pants tucked into socks creates a physical barrier. Light-colored clothing makes crawling ticks easier to spot. Permethrin-treated clothing is highly effective at repelling and killing ticks on contact, and the treatment lasts through multiple washes. DEET or picaridin applied to exposed skin adds another layer of protection.
The most important step is a thorough tick check after spending time outdoors. Hard ticks often crawl for a while before attaching, so checking within a few hours of coming inside catches many of them before they bite. Pay attention to the scalp, behind the ears, the armpits, the waistline, and behind the knees. Showering within two hours of being outdoors helps wash off unattached ticks. For dogs, check them carefully after walks, and talk to your vet about tick prevention products, since dogs in New Mexico are at risk for the same tick-borne diseases humans are.