An Ecological Study of Parasites of Some North Carolina Salamanders

Larval Hannemania sp. Infestations of Spea spp. in the Southern High Plains, Texas, USA

“…may have been present on these sympatric species but not detected because of a different manifestation of infestation. Rankin, 1937;Duszynski and Jones, 1973;Sladky et al, 2000), Hannemania sp. encountered in our study were not encysted in the dermis but were superficially attached to the surface of the skin.…”

“…have been documented as parasites of salamanders (Rankin, 1937;McAllister et al, 1995) and anurans (Loomis, 1956;Duszynski and Jones, 1973;McAllister, 1991;Jung et al, 2002) across North America. McAllister et al (1995) reported that 68% of 41 dusky salamanders, Desmognathus brimleyorum, were infested with larval Hannemania sp., and Winter et al (1986) reported 77% infestation of the same species by Hannemania dunni.…”

Intraspecific variation among trematodes of the genus Telorchis

“…Rankin (1937) observed that when large numbers of worms were present in natural infections of the salamander trematodes, Brachycoelium, Plagitura, and Megalodiscus, specimens were usually small, though mature, lilhen these flukes occurred in small numbers th^ were much larger. More recent experimental work by Boddeke (i960) demonstrated a decreased growth rate of Prosthogonimus ovatus when larger numbers of this fluke were present in the bursa Fabricius of the hen.…”

“…Little experimental study appears to have been undertaken with trematodes. The observation by Rankin (1937), that flukes (Brachycoelium) from naturally infected salamanders were small but gravid when large numbers of worms…”

“…Extent of vitelline follicles found when worms develop in chelonian and amphibian hosts eliminates this characteristic as a distinguishing one between T. bonnerensis and several other species within the genus. Rankin (1937) considered distribution of vitellaria to be the most variable character in Brachycoelium. The follicles were limited to a certain area, but distribution within that area constantly changed with contraction and extension of the worm.…”