Factors affecting Culicoides species composition and abundance in avian nests

Abstract

Mechanisms affecting patterns of vector distribution among host individuals may influence the population and evolutionary dynamics of vectors, hosts and the parasites transmitted. We studied the role of different factors affecting the species composition and abundance of Culicoides found in nests of the blue tit (Cyanistes caeruleus). We identified 1531 females and 2 males of 7 different Culicoides species in nests, with C. simulator being the most abundant species, followed by C. kibunensis, C. festivipennis, C. segnis, C. truncorum, C. pictipennis and C. circumscriptus. We conducted a medicationxfumigation experiment randomly assigning bird's nests to different treatments, thereby generating groups of medicated and control pairs breeding in fumigated and control nests. Medicated pairs were injected with the anti-malarial drug Primaquine diluted in saline solution while control pairs were injected with saline solution. The fumigation treatment was carried out using insecticide solution or water for fumigated and control nests respectively. Brood size was the main factor associated with the abundance of biting midges probably because more nestlings may produce higher quantities of vector attractants. In addition, birds medicated against haemoparasites breeding in non-fumigated nests supported a higher abundance of C. festivipennis than the rest of the groups. Also, we found that the fumigation treatment reduced the abundance of engorged Culicoides in both medicated and control nests, thus indicating a reduction of feeding success produced by the insecticide. These results represent the first evidence for the role of different factors in affecting the Culicoides infracommunity in wild avian nests.

Orientation behaviour of Culicoides obsoletus (Diptera: Ceratopogonidae), a relevant virus vector in northern Europe, toward host-associated odorant cues

“…Most species of the genus Culicoides are known to be either mammalophilic (Hair and Turner, 1968;Foxi and Delrio, 2010;Garros et al, 2011;Calvo et al, 2012) or ornithophilic (Bennett, 1960;Hair and Turner, 1968;Garvin and Greiner, 2003;Mullens et al, 2006; Martinez-de la Puente et al, 2009;Votypka et al, 2009;Foxi and Delrio, 2010;Cerny et al, 2011), although some feed on reptiles or frogs. In a previous study using animal-baited traps, horses were found to be the most attractive hosts for the three main Palaearctic Culicoides species, including C. obsoletus (Viennet et al, 2013).…”

Nest-climatic factors affect the abundance of biting flies and their effects on nestling condition

“…However, some important characteristics of nests location such as the distance to water sources do not affect the abundance of biting midges in blue tit nests (Tomás et al, 2008a). It is clear that host related factors, including brood size and hatching date, as well as weather conditions during the insect sampling period are of major importance to influence the abundance of biting flies in avian nests (Martínez-de la Puente et al, 2009aPuente et al, , 2009b. Furthermore, our results suggest that nest temperature did not affect significantly the presence/absence of black flies in avian nests.…”

“…The Spanish National Meteorological Institute provided daily maximum and minimum temperature data from the closest meteorological station located in Segovia, approximately 9 km from the study area. In previous studies, data from this meteorological station have been used to find clear effects of weather on several factors related to avian biology and birdehaematophagous insect interactions carried out in the same area (Sanz et al, 2003;Lobato et al, 2006;Martínez-de la Puente et al, 2009b). Environmental temperature was then estimated by calculating the averages of the maximum and minimum temperatures respectively for each insect sampling period.…”

“…Biting midges (genus Culicoides, Diptera: Ceratopogonidae) and black flies (Diptera: Simuliidae) are two of the main haematophagous insects attacking birds under natural conditions (Kettle, 1995;Malmqvist et al, 2004;Martínez-de la Puente et al, 2009a, 2009bVotýpka et al, 2009). Among these insects only females feed on animal blood, affecting hosts directly by draining resources and causing physical harassment and indirectly as vectors of multiple pathogens (Bennett, 1961;Valkiūnas, 2005).…”

“…To that end, we studied the interaction between pied flycatchers Ficedula hypoleuca and two different haematophagous insect groups, biting midges and black flies, after controlling for the potential effect of other variables such as brood size and hatching date (see Martínez-de la Puente et al, 2009b). Also, we investigated the potential negative effect of biting flies on nestling condition after controlling for the confounding effect of rearing conditions (Dawson et al, 2005b;Pérez et al, 2008).…”