Hi everyone...I just began backpacking last fall, and have been on 6 multi-night trips so far. I know that the ticks wouldn't be out in the late fall and early spring hikes I have been on.
The last two trips I went on with my meetup group, one in early June to Tar Jacket Ridge in Virginia, and the other to Dolly Sods this past weekend, none of us (9-10 in the group) had a single tick on us despite walking through knee to thigh high grass many times during the trips.
Did we just get lucky, or is there a reason we didn't have any tick issues? I actually dreaded going on both trips because of the tick hype, and was very happy that I didn't see any.