Gastrointestinal helminths of Adélie penguins (Pygoscelis adeliae) from Antarctica

Viruses associated with Antarctic wildlife: From serology based detection to identification of genomes using high throughput sequencing

“…Gastrointestinal parasites, particularly cestode and nematode species, are commonly found in Antarctic seals and penguins. Penguins tend to have a low diversity of parasites and similar profiles have been identified among penguins of the same genus (Diaz et al, 2016(Diaz et al, , 2013Fonteneau et al, 2011;Kleinertz et al, 2014;Vidal et al, 2012). Of the Antarctic seals, gastrointestinal parasites are most prevalent among Weddell and leopard seals.…”

Macroparasites in Antarctic Penguins

“…In general, former published surveys on helminths parasitizing Antarctic penguins often provided only a list of hosts and the parasites collected from them and with few cases reporting on the proportion of infected hosts (Johnston and Mawson 1945;Mawson 1953). Nevertheless, data about their prevalence, intensity, or abundance are scarce, and have only started to be provided in the last decades (Fonteneau et al 2011;Vidal et al 2012;Diaz et al 2013Diaz et al , 2016. Despite this apparent gap, there is a sufficient number of publications that, when compiled and compared, allow as a fairly comprehensive assessment of the richness of helminths present in Antarctic penguins.…”

“…The core component of the helminth fauna of Antarctic penguins are cestodes, mainly Parorchites zederi (Dilepididae). This species is the only cyclophyllidean present in pelagic birds and is widely distributed among Antarctic penguins, including the three pygoscelid species and the Emperor penguin (Cielecka et al 1992;Vidal et al 2012;Diaz et al 2013Diaz et al , 2016Kleinertz et al 2014). The presence of Cyclophyllidea eggs has also been demonstrated in the feces of Adélie penguins (Fredes et al 2008), and it is reasonable to presume these were P. zederi.…”

“…Stegophorus macronectes (Johnston and Mawson 1942) (Acuariidae) is the best represented species. This acuarid nematode has a wide host and geographical distribution, having been reported in all pygoscelid species (Vidal et al 2012;Diaz et al 2013Diaz et al , 2016 and in the Rockhopper and Macaroni penguins in Sub-Antarctic regions (Johnston and Mawson 1945;Mawson 1953;Zdzitowiecki and Drózdz 1980). The taxonomical and nomenclatural history of this species is complex, and different synonyms were employed in the past including Stegophorus adeliae Johnston and Mawson 1945and Stegophorus paradelia Johnston, 1938sensu Petter, 1959(see Vidal et al 2016.…”

“…Tetrameres wetzeli (Schmidt 1965) is the only species on the genus described parasitizing penguin hosts, Rockhopper, King, and Gentoo penguins (Schmidt 1965;Fontaneau et al 2011;Diaz et al 2013). Undetermined species of Tetrameres were also found in Adélie penguins (Diaz et al 2016).…”