The present knowledge of the helminth fauna and ecology of helminths in the bank vole Clethrionomys glareolus is reviewed, with special emphasis on the geographical variability of helminth assemblages. The helminth fauna of bank vole is highly predictable throughout its distribution range, with the possible exception of England and Wales. In the latter region, helminth species diversity was lower and species dominance relationships were different, compared with those on the continental regions. The patterns of seasonal and long-term population dynamics of helminths are reviewed, showing that life-cycles do not determine the patterns of seasonal variability of helminth populations. Although some helminth species show patchy spatial distribution in the field, (high) aggregation of helminth species among host population is shown to pe due to differences between host individuals in exposure and/or susceptibility, rather than spatial heterogeneity on a higher scale. Two unpublished experiments show that the ubiquitous helminth species of bank voles, Heligmosomum mixtum (Nematoda), has the potential to act as a mortality factor if the quality of the host diet is poor, but bank vole populations are unlikely to be regulated by this nematode.
This study reviews the taxonomy of anoplocephaline cestodes of wood rats, Neotoma cinerea, N. fuscipes and N. mexicana (Sigmodontinae) in the western and south-western U.S.A. The anoplocephaline fauna included five species, only one of which, Andrya neotomae Voge, 1946, was relatively common and occurred in all three host species. Other species were Paranoplocephala freemani Haukisalmi, Henttonen et Hardman, 2006, P. primordialis (Douthitt, 1915), both host-generalist species of North American rodents, and two apparently undescribed species of Paranoplocephala s. str. Aprostatandrya octodonensis Babero et Cattan, 1975 from the indigenous South American rodent Octodon degus is regarded as a junior synonym of A. neotomae. A redescription is provided for A. neotomae.
Paranoplocephala kalelai (Tenora, Haukisalmi et Henttonen, 1985) is an anoplocephalid cestode that primarily parasitizes the grey-sided vole Myodes rufocanus (syn. Clethrionomys rufocanus) in northern Fennoscandia. In a preliminary molecular phylogenetic analysis, the cytochrome oxidase I (mtDNA) sequences of P. kalelai formed two divergent sublineages originating from two different localities in northern Finland and northern Norway. The present data confirm the existence of two strongly supported clades and show that their geographic distributions are overlapping in northernmost Finland. Relatively deep genetic divergence and coexistence of the two main clades at one of the localities suggest that the material may include two biological species. However, because the specimens representing the two mtDNA clades of P. kalelai are not morphometrically sufficiently differentiated and because the mtDNA clade of the specimens from the type locality is unknown, they are not assigned to different species. Comparison with the existing phylogeographic data of M. rufocanus suggests that the genetic structure of this host-specific cestode reflects the glacial and post-glacial history of its primary host. A redescription is presented for P. kalelai.
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