Parasites of some free-living wild animals and freshwater fish species in South Africa

Abstract

This collection of papers comprises four sections. The first section deals with the helminth and arthropod parasites recovered from a variety of mammalian hosts, and consists of four chapters. The first chapter deals with the taxonomy of the parasites of mammalian hosts, where some 15 nematode species were either newly described, redescribed or descriptions amended, and the immature stages of an oestrid fly and the adults of two hippoboscid flies described. The second describes the seasonal occurrence of arthropod and helminth parasites recovered from approximately 1 380 antelope, scrub hares, warthogs and bushpigs. In the third chapter some miscellaneous natural and experimental findings of helminths in free-living hosts are presented, amongst others several new host-parasite associations and the proceedings of symposia, while the fourth chapter deals with the pathology of natural infections of impalas with Cooperiodes hepaticae, kudus with Elaeophora sagitta and buffaloes with Parafilaria bassoni. The second section deals with the parasites of freshwater fishes. In the taxonomic part of this section, Chapter 1, one trematode genus is redescribed, and one new trematode species and 14 new nematode species described. In the second chapter, the seasonal occurrence of the helminth parasites of approximately 700 freshwater fish representing 14 species is presented. The third part deals with the helminths of lizards, snakes and crocodiles, where a new Paraspirura species, a new Madathamugadia species and some 14 new species, subspecies and forms of subspecies of the oxyurid genera Spauligodon, Skrjabinodon, Thelandros and Tachygonetria were described. A comprehensive host-parasite list of snakes and lizards is included, as is an equally comprehensive host-parasite list of the pentastome parasites of crocodiles. In the fourth part, two new Tetrameres species are described and the population dynamics of guineafowls and Swainson’s spurfowl discussed. A complete list of the helminth parasites of guineafowls is listed, together with an extended host list of these parasites.