Haemaphysalis (Kaiseriana) mageshimaensis (Ixodoidea: Ixodidae): Human and Wild and Domestic Mammal Hosts, and Distribution in Japan, Taiwan, and China

Abstract

Haemaphysalis (Kaiseriana) mageshimaensis Saito and Hoogstraal, originally described from specimens from vegetation (and laboratory-reared) from Mage Island, Japan, is now recorded from over 1,800 additional samples taken in Taiwan and nearby Lu-tao and Lan-yu islands, and in southeastern China and Hong Kong. Adults, and often also nymphs, parasitize wild carnivores (palm civet, leopard cat, and tiger), the barking deer, humans, domestic goats, and other domestic mammals. Numerous larvae parasitized a palm civet and a leopard cat. Fewer larvae were taken from rats, birds, and domestic goats and dogs. The field data show no evidence of parthenogenetic reproduction. From field observations of sick goat and cattle hosts, the frequency of biting humans, and an unusually wide pattern of immaturestage host relationships, this parasite is a candidate for medical, veterinary, and biological investigation. Haemaphysalis (Kaiseriana) mageshimaensis Saito and Hoogstraal (1973), described from samples taken on vegetation (and laboratoryreared) on Mage Island, a few miles south of Kyushu, Japan, is now recorded from Taitung Hsien of southeastern Taiwan, nearby Lu-tao and Lan-yu islands, and southeastern China and Hong Kong. Known hosts of adults, and often also of nymphs, are wild carnivores, the muntjac or barking deer, and the domestic goat, cow, dog, buffalo, and pig. Larvae, together with adults and nymphs, were numerous in two collections from wild carnivores and numbered one or two in a few collections from rats, birds, and domestic goats and dogs. Heavy infestations occurred on domestic goats and on wild carnivores and a muntjac. Some goat and cattle hosts were observed to be ill. In Japan, this species is considered to be a likely vector of bovine Theileria sp. (Saito and Hoogstraal, loc. cit.). From these observations, as well as from the several records of Received for publication 29 March 1974. * From Research Projects MR041.09.01-0037A 6GI and -0133B 6GI, Bureau of Medicine and Surgery, Department of the Navy, Washington, D. C. The opinions and assertions contained herein are the private ones of the authors and are not to be construed as official or as reflecting the views of the Department of the Navy or of the naval service at large. This investigation was supported in part by Agreement 03-005-1 between the NIAID (NIH) and NAMRU-3. t U. S. Naval Medical Research Unit Number Three (NAMRU-3), American Embassy, Cairo, Arab Republic of Egypt. + NAMRU-2, Taipei, Taiwan. biting humans during a few days of exploring Lan-yu Island, H. (K.) mageshimaensis is a candidate for more precise and extensive biological, medical, and veterinary investigation. Saito (in Saito and Hoogstraal, loc. cit.) showed the ability of the Japanese population of H. (K.) mageshimaensis to reproduce parthenogenetically in the laboratory but no evidence for this phenomenon is found in the field data from Taiwan, Lan-yu, Lu-tao, and China. As in the closely related H. (K.) longicornis Neumann (Hoogstraal et al., 1968), parthenogenesis may be a more or less highly developed survival mechanism in members of this tropical group that have spread and adapted to colder temperate environments.