New records of bat flies (Diptera: Streblidae) in Oaxaca, Mexico

Abstract

Species richness and parasitic prevalence of bat flies in a bat cave community in Oaxaca are reported. Between 2016 and 2018, a total of 732 bats were captured and inspected for streblids. We recorded 15 bat species from 3 families and obtained 1,317 streblid specimens corresponding to 24 species and 8 genera, including 19 species that are new records for the state:

A Five-Year Study on Infestation and Abundance of Bat Flies (Hippoboscoidea: Streblidae) Under Severe Dry Season Conditions in the Tropical Dry Forest of Yucatan, Mexico

“…Three species ( N. parnellii , Trichobius johnsonae , and Trichobius sparsus ) are new records from Yucatan, increasing the current species list to 22. These bat fly species were previously recorded in TDF in other regions of the country (Zarazúa-Carbajal et al 2016 ; Hernández-Martínez et al 2019 ; Salinas-Ramos et al 2018 ) and in the same host species (Veracruz-Guerrero and Morales-Malacara 1996 ; Cuxim-Coyoc et al 2015 ; Tlapaya-Romero et al et al 2019 ). The bat flies recorded in this study also represent 27% of the species richness documented in TDF bat communities in Mexico (Zarazúa-Carbajal et al 2016 ; Hernández-Martínez et al 2019 ; Salinas-Ramos et al 2018 ).…”

Association of bat flies (Diptera: Streblidae) and bats: Richness and host specificity in Western Mexico

“…We also report T. sphaeronotus parasitizing Mormoops megalophylla (Peters, 1986). This association is reported in other studies ( Cuxim-Koyoc et al, 2018 ; Ramírez-Martínez et al, 2016 ); however, it is questioned whether it was accidental or an association that was not well documented because T. sphaeronotus is a characteristic parasite of bats of the genus Leptonycteris ( Cuxim-Koyoc et al, 2018 ; Guerrero and Morales-Malacara, 1996 ; Tlapaya-Romero et al, 2019 ). Our results suggest that there are few records of T. sphaeronotus on M. megalophylla because it is a secondary host, being found in a few individuals in the population since Leptonycteris species are its primary hosts.…”

“…In the case of some species of the genus Nycterophillia , which in this study occurs in a single host species, is important to note that in these cases the host sample size is small. Other studies have found that this genus parasitizes more than one species of the Mormoopidae family ( Guerrero and Morales-Malacara, 1996 ; Salinas-Ramos et al, 2018 ; Tlapaya-Romero et al, 2019 ). It is important to highlight the above since as Poulin (2008) mentions, there is an evident danger in the use of these estimates of specificity when making this estimate from a single sample in a single sampling site and comparing it with a second, from which there are records of a very wide geographical area and on a regular basis, and of several populations of the same host species over a long period of time.…”

Review of studies about bat-fly interactions inside roosts, with observations on partnership patterns for publications

“…Apparently, caves have been the preferred study sites of researchers working with zoonoses because they may concentrate many bats, ectoparasites, and guano. The term “Diversity” in roosts appears indirectly contemplated based on molecular studies (Jansen Van Vuren et al 2017 ; Abundes-Gallegos et al 2018 ) and directly, in species inventories (Barbier et al 2018 ; Tlapaya-Romero et al 2019 ). The publication of inventories of bats and their bat-ectoparasites is essential because they can indicate whether each roost should be viewed as a research target, depending on the focus of the research.…”