A 24-minute documentary about ticks and the diseases they can pass on to humans, titled "Hidden in the Leaves," has just been released at the height of tick season. It was written, directed and narrated by Mary Healey Jamiel, who teaches film media at the University of Rhode Island. The film features the work of Dr. Thomas Mather, professor of entomology and director of the Center for Vector-Borne Disease. Rhode Islanders, Mather said, live within "the heart of tick country" and encounter ticks routinely "in their own backyards." Now playing at libraries across the state, the film will air on R.I. PBS Channel 36 (Cox 8) throughout the month. A couple of nuggets that won't make it into my story in this Thursday's Independent:
Unlike most Rhode Islanders, Mather doesn't look romantically at those 150,000 miles of stone walls lining the southern New England landscape. "Rodent condominiums," he calls them. And, given his choice, one of the last places on Earth he'd vacation is Nantucket. "I call it Nanticket. It's kind of a tick-infested hell hole."
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