Abstract
The study of parasite body size is an important approach to understand the different patterns of helminth community structure, once it is usually analysed using only numerical descriptors which do not capture size heterogeneity among parasite species. In the present study, we compared the pattern in the helminth community of three sympatric wild rodent species Akodon cursor, A. montensis and Oligoryzomys nigripes using numerical abundance and biomass approaches. The cestode Rodentolepis akodontis was the worm with highest biomass in the three rodents. The trichostrongylid Stilestrongylus lanfrediae presented highest biomass in O. nigripes and represented 70% of the total numeric abundance of parasites. Interestingly, for Akodon spp. the species with more biomass represented less than 10% of the total numerical abundance. Parasites with the higher numeric abundance do not have the largest body size. Although the biomass pattern is different from numeric abundance, this difference does not influence in the helminth distribution community among the three sympatric hosts. The status change of a helminth species within the community due to its volumetric dominance might justify a new approach since parasites belonging to different taxa obtain resources from the host in different ways.
Highlights
The structure of communities could be determined by the number of species present, their abundances, and realised niches (Lotz, 1985)
The trichostrongylid S. lanfrediae presented high biomass in O. nigripes when compared to the other species, this species represented 70% of the total numeric abundance of parasites (Table 2)
The number of individual parasites per host described by Bush et al (1997) is defined as parasite abundance and has a substantial importance to evaluate the parasitism as an ecological process or a selective force (Poulin and GeorgeNascimento, 2007)
Summary
The structure of communities could be determined by the number of species present, their abundances, and realised niches (Lotz, 1985). One of the interespecific patterns most reported is the relationship between abundance and body size (Blackburn et al, 1996). Patterns in parasite communities are commonly detected using only numerical descriptors, which may not hold when parasite mass is used (Muñoz and George-Nascimento, 2008). Studies related to the body size host and their parasite biovolume, mainly in fish, has been increased (Poulin, 1999; Poulin and George-Nascimento, 2007). It is assumed that the total parasite biomass harboured by an individual host species reflects the energy demands of both the host and parasite (George-Nascimento et al, 2002), and can highlight factors that determine the helminth community structure
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