| Title: | "Parasite insight: assessing fitness costs, infection risks and foraging benefits relating to gastrointestinal nematodes in wild mammalian herbivores" |
| Author(s): | Coulson G; Cripps JK; Garnick S; Bristow V; Beveridge I; |
| Address: | "School of BioSciences, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Victoria 3010, Australia gcoulson@unimelb.edu.au. School of BioSciences, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Victoria 3010, Australia. Faculty of Veterinary and Agricultural Sciences, The University of Melbourne, Veterinary Clinical Centre, Werribee, Victoria 3030, Australia. Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning, Arthur Rylah Institute for Environmental Research, 123 Brown Street, Heidelberg, Victoria 3084, Australia. Department of Wildlife and Fisheries Sciences, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX 77843, USA" |
| Journal Title: | Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci |
| ISSN/ISBN: | 1471-2970 (Electronic) 0962-8436 (Print) 0962-8436 (Linking) |
| Abstract: | "Mammalian herbivores are typically infected by parasitic nematodes, which are acquired through direct, faecal-oral transmission. These parasites can cause significant production losses in domestic livestock, but much less is known about impacts on wild mammalian hosts. We review three elements of parasitism from the host's perspective: fitness costs of infection, risks of infection during foraging and benefits of nutritious pasture. The majority of wildlife studies have been observational, but experimental manipulation is increasing. Treatment with anthelmintics to manipulate parasite load has revealed varied impacts of parasites on fitness variables across host species, but has not produced consistent evidence for parasite-induced anorexia or impaired body condition. Some experimental studies of infection risk have manipulated faecal contamination and detected faecal avoidance by hosts. Only two field studies have explored the trade-off between infection risk and nutritional benefit generated by avoidance of contaminated patches. Overall, field studies of costs, risks and benefits of the host-parasite relationship are limited and few have examined more than one of these elements. Parasitism has much in common with predation, and future insights into anti-parasite responses by wild hosts could be gained from the conceptual and technical developments in research on anti-predator behaviour.This article is part of the Theo Murphy meeting issue 'Evolution of pathogen and parasite avoidance behaviours'" |
| Keywords: | Animals *Feeding Behavior Gastrointestinal Diseases/epidemiology/parasitology/*veterinary *Genetic Fitness Herbivory Host-Parasite Interactions *Mammals/genetics/physiology Nematode Infections/epidemiology/pathology/*veterinary Prevalence Risk anthelminti; |
| Notes: | "MedlineCoulson, Graeme Cripps, Jemma K Garnick, Sarah Bristow, Verity Beveridge, Ian eng Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't Review England 2018/06/06 Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci. 2018 Jul 19; 373(1751):20170197. doi: 10.1098/rstb.2017.0197" |
