Thursday, November 18, 2010

Dactylogyrus / Notropis telescopus manuscript almost ready to go

I think I've finally polished our manuscript on the patterns of Dactylogyrus spatulus gill parasite infections of telescope shiners, Notropis telescopus. It's relatively short, with 4 figures (2 could be combined as 1, really). If both co-authors, Brittany and Andrew, like it as is I'll go back and format it specifically for submission to the journal Freshwater Biology (Brittany told me she thought it was OK). Here's the current version of the abstract:

ABSTRACT: Dactylogyrus is a holarctic genus of trematode flatworms that infect the gills of cyprinid fishes. Dactylogyrus species are usually highly host specific, and little is known about their life history in North America. The purpose of this study was twofold: to determine whether Dactylogyrus exhibits seasonality in its life cycle, and if there is any effect upon reproductive effort of the host as a result of Dactylogyrus infection. We examined 383 Telescope Shiners, Notropis telescopus, collected from Hurricane Creek and Estill Fork in the upper Paint Rock River system in Jackson County, northeastern Alabama, USA, from February to September, 2007, and October, 2008 to January, 2009. A total of 967 Dactylogyrus spatulus were found on the gill arches of fish collected. Parasite counts yielded a peak in the average number of parasites present per fish in May, a significant relationship between host length and infection, and a negative correlation between higher parasite load and gonadosomatic index (GSI). Parasites per fish averaged about 1.5 from August to February, with an average high of just under 6 per fish in May. Chi square tests of the assumptions that parasites are evenly distributed among individual host fish and in each month groups lead to the rejection of both assumptions, with the months of March through July as a prevalence peak for Dactylogyrus infection. These months are the time of gonadal development and reproduction in Telescope Shiners. Both male and female fish with higher parasite infections had significantly lower GSI than fish with lower parasite infections.

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