Levels of helminth infection in the flat lizard Tropidurus semitaeniatus from north-eastern Brazil

Abstract

Parasites represent a great, unknown component of animal biodiversity. Recent efforts have begun to uncover patterns of infection by helminth parasites in several Neotropical lizards. The present study reports, for the first time, levels of helminth infection in a population of the flat lizard Tropidurus semitaeniatus. One hundred and thirty-nine lizards were examined and evidence of five intestinal helminth species was found, comprising four species of nematodes, one species of cestode and an unidentified encysted larval nematode. The most frequently occurring species was the intestinal nematode Parapharyngodon alvarengai, which did not exhibit differences in prevalence and intensity of infection relative to host sex or age/body size. Furthermore, helminth species richness was not related to host body size.

Ecology and parasitism of the lizard Tropidurus jaguaribanus (Squamata: Tropiduridae) from northeastern Brazil

“…Differences in infection levels between the sexes usually is related to a differential in the prey consumption, microhabitat use, or activity time (Aho 1990). However, both sexes in the present study had similar prey consumption and used the same microhabitat, thereby corroborating the results of Bezerra et al (2016) for T. semitaeniatus.…”

“…The overall prevalence of parasites found in T. jaguaribanus is low in contrast to those of other species of Tropidurus (e.g., Anjos et al 2013, Pereira et al 2013, but the value is similar to that of T. semitaeniatus (Bezerra et al 2016). The prevalence is less than a half of that recorded for T. hispidus (63%) (Galdino et al 2014), which is sympatric with T. jaguaribanus.…”

“…and S. oscari) are relatively common in species of Tropidurus. They have been recorded in T. torquatus (Ribas et al 1998, T. semitaeniatus (Brito et al 2014, Bezerra et al 2016, T. hispidus (Anjos et al 2013, Galdino et al 2014), and T. guarani Alvarez, Cei and Scolaro, 1994(Vicente 1981). All parasites found in T. jaguaribanus are new host records.…”

“…We suspect that the differences in infection levels result from the behavioral and ecological segregation of these life stages. Thus, a positive relation among host body size, intensity of infection, and parasite richness is expected (Poulin 1997), but this correlation is not found in T. jaguaribanus, T. semitaeniatus (Rocha et al 2003, Menezes et al 2004, Bezerra et al 2016, or T. hispidus (Galdino et al 2014). Aho (1990) reported that the effects of age on infection patterns in lizards are related to ontogenetic differences in the diet.…”

Helminth parasites of Mabuya arajara Rebouças-Spieker, 1981 (Lacertilia: Mabuyidae) from Chapada do Araripe, northeastern Brazil

“…infected lizards and transferred to amphibians (Sousa et al 2015;Montes-Oca et al 2016). Among lizards, previous host records include the Maldonado 1998), Scincidae (Freitas 1957;Brito et al 2014), Teiidae (Padilha and Duarte 1979;Macedo et al 2017), and Tropiduridae (Brito et al 2014;Galdino et al 2014;Bezerra et al 2015;Araújo-Filho et al 2016;Václav et al 2017). Among amphibians, hosts include members of the Bufonidae (Luque et al 2005) and Hylidae families (Montes-Oca et al 2016).…”