Nematofauna of red piranha Pygocentrus nattereri (Kner, 1958) (Characiformes: Serrasalmidae) from Amazonia, Brazil

Abstract

Between March and October 2008, 355 specimens of Pygocentrus nattereri were collected from the lowland lakes of Central Amazonia, Brazil, to study their nematode fauna. A total of 1.116 specimens of Nematoda were collected, belonging to six species. Procamallanus (Spirocamallanus) inopinatus was the species with the highest parasite indices. Larvae of Anisakis sp. have zoonotic potential and were found parasitizing the intestine and liver of Pygocentrus nattereri. Some of these nematode species were new records for the host P. nattereri. The diversity of nematodes that use P. nattereri as a host indicates the important role of this fish species in the maintenance of these six nematode species in the lowland lakes of Central Amazonia.

New host record and geographical distribution of Nematoda parasitizing Hypophthalmus marginatus Valenciennes (Siluriformes) from the Tocantins River, Brazil

“…Among freshwater fishes from Brazil, Anisakis sp. larvae have been reported in B. filamentosum, O. niger, and P. squamosissimus from Colares and Vigia Island, State of Pará (Rodrigues et al, 2015), in P. squamosissimus from Marajó Bay, and the Tapajó River and Amazon River, State of Pará (Fontenelle et al 2016;Souza, Eiras, Adriano, & Corrêa, 2020), in Triportheus angulatus (Spix & Agassiz, 1829) from Catalão Lake and the Solimões River, State of Amazon (Moreira, Oliveira, Morey, & Malta, 2017), and from Serrasalmus altispinis Merckx, Jégu and Santos, 2000 and Pygocentrus nattereri Kner, 1858 from the Solimões River, State of Amazon (Morey & Malta, 2018;Morais, Cárdenas, & Malta, 2019).…”

Helminth endoparasites of endemic fish Pygocentrus piraya (Characiformes, Serrasalmidae) from Três Marias reservoir, Minas Gerais, Brazil

“…Although congeneric species P. nattereri is native to the Amazon and Paraná river basins, it can be found in several South American countries (Froese & Pauly 2019). Its endoparasite fauna was investigated by Rego & Eiras (1989), Rego & Pavanelli (1990), Moravec (1998), Pavanelli et al (2004), Thatcher (2006, Barros et al (2006Barros et al ( , 2010, Vieira et al (2010Vieira et al ( , 2011, Morais et al (2011Morais et al ( , 2019, Benigno et al (2012), Cárdenas et al (2012), Vicentin et al (2013) and Brito-Junior & Tavares-Dias (2018). The current study has investigated the endoparasite fauna of fish species P. piraya because the few studies carried out on this topic (Travassos et al 1928, Moreira et al 1994, Brasil-Sato 2003, Moravec et al 2008, Santos et al 2009, Monteiro et al 2016) have indicated that this piranha species is a potential host for peculiar endoparasite fauna in Três Marias reservoir, upper São Francisco river, state of Minas Gerais, Brazil.…”