Composition and Distribution on a Host of Avian Lice of White Storks in North-Eastern Algeria

Abstract

The diversity and spatial distribution of ectoparasites of a large colony of white stork Ciconia ciconia at Dréan, in north-eastern Algeria, were investigated during two consecutive breeding seasons. The results indicated that nestlings were infested by the following four louse species: Colpocephalum zebra (Burmeister, 1838), Neophilopterus incompletus (Denny, 1842), Ardeicola ciconiae (Linnaeus, 1758), and Ciconiphilus quadripustulatus (Burmeister, 1838). Overall, the distribution of chewing lice exhibited a clustered distribution, with C. zebra being the most frequent species, with a prevalence of 39.6% and 41.0% in 2011 and 2012, respectively. Our results also suggested niche partitioning among the four louse species within the host’s body parts. A generalized additive model indicated that size, sex, and year influenced the abundance of ectoparasites; the abundance of chewing lice increased with the size of the host and was greater in females, as well as in the first year of study. Further studies are needed to explore the spatio-temporal variability in white storks’ lice infestations.

Is there an effect of electromagnetic waves from base stations on the breeding success of Ciconia ciconia ciconia in Algeria?

“…In Algeria, the white stork C. ciconia nests commonly in the Mediterranean part, from the coastal plains to the steppe high plateaux (Moali-Grine et al, 2013). It has been the subject of numerous studies, particularly on density parameters (Moali-Grine et al, 2004), diet and trophic niche (Cheriak et al, 2014;Chenchouni et al, 2015), reproduction (Bouriach et al, 2015), parasitism (Touati et al, 2022) and the effects of climate change (Mammeria et al, 2019); but in Algeria no study has yet focused on the effect of base stations on the species' reproduction. Our aim is to analyse the data available for the first time in Algeria to determine whether there is a correlation between exposure to the electromagnetic waves emitted by mobile phone base stations and the reproduction rate of white storks.…”