Humidity effects on avian blood parasites in the Caatinga of Brazil
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ORIGINAL ARTICLE
Humidity effects on avian blood parasites in the Caatinga of Brazil Regina Carolina Ferreira de Souza Gomes 1 & Bárbara Luiza Barbosa Teixeira 1 & Cássia Lima Silva Gusmão 1 & Alexandre M. Fernandes 1 Received: 18 October 2019 / Revised: 1 April 2020 / Accepted: 4 May 2020 # Sociedade Brasileira de Ornitologia 2020
Abstract The Caatinga is an ecologically diverse region encompassing a variety of environments. Given the influence of the environment on parasite–host systems, the goals of this study were to investigate the presence of hemoparasites in birds from different Caatinga physiognomies, both for comparison among them and between the Caatinga and other documented biomes. For this, we collected blood samples from 59 birds in three Caatinga physiognomies from the state of Pernambuco, Brazil. In comparison with previous studies in other biomes, the frequency of hemoparasites in the different environments of the Caatinga (20%) is higher than that of the Cerrado (7%), and the same as obtained for the Atlantic Forest (20%). The Caatinga physiognomy that revealed the highest hemoparasitism index is known as Brejo de Altitude (high-altitude humid area). Brejos de Altitude occurs between ca. 500 and 1100 m a.s.l., where orographic rains result in levels of rainfall that can reach 1200 mm/year. The coincidence of frequencies of hemoparasites for Caatinga and Atlantic Forest may arise from the detected high frequency of parasitized individuals in the Brejo de Altitude. The blood samples from this region were responsible for 60% of the parasitized samples of our study. This could be attributable to higher humidity, facilitating higher reproductive success of the parasite vectors. Keywords Avian malaria . Haemoproteus . Neotropical region . Northeast Brazil . Plasmodium
Introduction Birds can be infected by different blood parasites such as helminths and protozoans. Among the hemoparasitic protozoans, the genera Haemoproteus, Plasmodium, and Leucocytozoon (order: Haemosporida) stand out in frequency of occurrence (Braga et al. 2010). Both protozoans and their vectors (hematophagous insects of the order Diptera) are widely distributed on the globe (Braga et al. 2011). Birds infected by hemoparasites may have their ability to establish territories and to face predators compromised. In addition, blood parasites may result in their hosts consuming less food, losing body mass and becoming severely sick or even dying (Coatney et al. 1945; Atkinson 1988; Laferty and Morris 1996; Maksimowich and Mathis 2000).
Communicated by: Caio G. Machado. * Alexandre M. Fernandes [email protected] 1
Laboratory of Vertebrate Zoology, Federal Rural University of Pernambuco, Serra Talhada Campus, Serra Talhada, Pernambuco, Brazil
Aguilar et al. (2018) discussed how in the Neotropics, where host diversity is higher, host immune systems could be compromised by habitat loss. Moens and Pérez-Tris (2016) show that in the Neotropical region the degree of blood parasite infection of the genera Plasmodium and Haemo
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