Here we go.. clearly your tick feeds on deer, see article and the spread of the lone star tick has done so with the help of the white tailed deer...

http://entnemdept.ufl.edu/creatures/..._star_tick.htm

And in addition, here is an article saying you might wind up needing an antibiotic from your type of tick for symptoms sounding suspiciously like lyme disease, to include swollen joints, even though this particular article says it's not lyme disease - they gave it another name and a very long (and abnoxious) abbreviation to boot.

http://www.tickinfo.com/lonestartick.htm

Dot or no dot on the tick, I would have put it in a plastic baggie and made an appt. with my orthopedic guy who discovered I had lyme disease, showed him the tick and then asked him what to do. I know he would have said no harm in a dose of antibiotic just to be careful and handed me a script and sent me on my way.

My orthopedic guy, Doctor McDevitt of Glen Burnie, says that he has parents bringing kids in with what they believe to be 'growing pains' all the time and it all turns out to be lyme.

Like I said, Good luck, but you can never be too careful these days.

Also, it's not really the deer I found out.. it's the white footed mouse. The infection starts from mouse to tick. Then the ticks go to deer. It just happens to be the kind of ticks that feed on deer that are involved, which includes your tick. Sometimes a harsh winter can make the usual plentiful white footed mouse scarce, that's when the hungry ticks get more aggressive and go after people too. Summers that are really bad for getting lyme disease usually follow a winter that killed off a lot of mice, the ticks favorite food. I read this a while back, don't have the link anymore.

Ok, here's an article similar to the one I was trying to paraphrase... will give you the gist of it... just noticed that they mentioned Chipmunks here , and not just mice. http://www.wwhd.org/TLD_CD/ticks.htm