Community of bat flies (Streblidae and Nycteribiidae) on bats in the Cerrado of Central-West Brazil: hosts, aggregation, prevalence, infestation intensity, and infracommunities

ABSTRACT

Streblidae and Nycteribiidae are families of bloodsucking flies that parasitize bats exclusively. We studied the community of these flies in a Cerrado area in the Central-West Brazil. We captured 708 bats over 17 nights from October 2012 to March 2013. Forty-five per cent of the hosts were parasitized by 836 specimens of bat flies of 22 species. The most abundant flies were Trichobius joblingi on Carollia perspicillata, followed by Megistopoda aranea on Artibeus planirostris, and Strebla guajiro on C. perspicillata. All bat flies showed a high level of specificity for their hosts. Trichobius joblingi was the bat fly with the highest prevalence (80%) and mean intensity of infestation (3.5) on hosts with a representative sample size (n > 20). This result is likely related to the type of roosting (cavity) used by C. perspicillata, primary host of this fly species. Anoura caudifer hosted the largest infracommunities (n = 7). However, most bats were parasitized by a single fly species, suggesting a pattern in infestations. The aggregation index was high, indicating an unequal occurrence in parasite infestations. The majority of hosts were infested by few or no flies and few hosts were highly infested, showing a negative binomial distribution.

KEYWORDS:

• Basilia ortizi
• Chiroptera
• ectoparasite
• Eptesicus diminutus
• host–parasite relationship
• specificity

Acknowledgments

We thank Camila Lima, Patrick Oliveira, and Renan Olivier for support in fieldwork; Jonas Escorcio Neto for help with logistics; Marcelo Bordignon for taxonomic confirmation of host species; and Julie Shapiro for help with the English version of the manuscript. We are very grateful to anonymous reviewers and Anne Zillikens who provided valuable input and comments on a previous version of the manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

We thank the Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES) for scholarships to EB, and Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq) for grants to GG [process #302328/2012-2].