Epizootiology of Posthodiplostomum minimum (MacCallum) and Proteocephalus ambloplitis (Leidy) in bluegill (Lepomis macrochirus Rafinesque)

Abstract

A total of 529 bluegills (Lepomis macrochirus) from two Iowa ponds was examined for infections of parasitic white grubs (Posthodiplostomum minimum) and bass tapeworms (Proteocephalus ambloplitis). Fish from pond 1 harbored significantly greater levels of both parasites than did fish from pond 2. Female pond 1 bluegills generally supported greater intensities of P. minimum and P. ambloplitis than did males. A correlation coefficient (r) was determined as a measure of the relationship between metacercariae and plerocercoid populations in sexually mature pond 1 bluegills. A significant positive correlation was found, indicating that, as one parasite population increased or decreased, the other population did likewise. Fibrotic liver cysts were found in 25% of all age class IV pond 1 bluegills. Female fish exhibited a greater percent of lesions (30%) than did males (17%). The infection intensity of P. ambloplitis plerocercoids was significantly greater in hosts with fibrotic livers than in those without the fibrotic cysts.

Estimating diet in individual pumpkinseed sunfish Lepomis gibbosus using stomach contents, stable isotopes and parasites

“…in the liver, which may be long‐lived, but less so for C. oxycephalus in the intestine, which probably live c . 1 year in the host (McDaniel & Bailey, 1974; Bailey, 1984; Anderson, 2000; Steinauer & Font, 2003). An interestingly similar observation was recorded by Valtonen et al .…”