When Susannah Lerman talked with fellow researchers and friends about her study of the effects of less frequent lawn mowing to improve habitat for native bees, the response she heard most had nothing to do with bees. “The first thing people said was that letting the grass get longer would invite ticks,” said Lerman, a research ecologist with the USDA Forest Service’s Northern Research Station. “It was clear that before we could make the case for promoting lawns as bee habitat, we had to understand the tick risk.”