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Phenological variation in parasite load and inflammatory response in a lizard with an asynchronous reproductive cycle

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Abstract

We present the first study that compares phenological variation in parasite load and inflammatory response in a lizard with asynchronous male and female gonadal cycles. Other studies have used many species with seasonal and synchronous reproductive cycles, in which it is difficult to decouple the effects of internal and external factors that can affect parasite abundance in each sex. Species with asynchronous reproductive cycles provide the opportunity to study the effects of seasonality and reproductive condition separately, but few studies have documented variation in parasite abundance in these species. We made an extensive comparison of parasite load and inflammatory response of the lizard Sceloporus torquatus, a species with asynchronous reproductive cycles, throughout its active period. We hypothesized that the parasite load would be higher in the period of maximum gonadal activity for each sex, negatively related to body condition and inflammatory response. Our results partially support the hypothesis; males had more parasites in summer than in spring and autumn, while females had more parasites in spring and summer than in autumn; however, we do not find a relationship between parasite load, body condition and inflammatory response. Our results indicated that host-parasite interactions are complex and depend upon both environmental and internal factors. Therefore, longer-term studies may provide a more comprehensive picture of host-parasite dynamics in populations of wild lizards.

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Acknowledgements

Many thanks go to Gabriel Suárez and Luis Macotela for field assistance and Mercedes Pichardo for their help and technical support

We are grateful to the Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnología (Ph.D. degree scholarship JRR and JCGM) and the Secretaría del Medio Ambiente y Recursos Naturales for the permits to collect animals (SGPA/DGVS/02407/15). We also thank Dra. Erendira Quintana Sánchez for field assistance. The authors thank the two anonymous reviewers for their comments to improve the manuscript.

Funding

This work was funded by Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnología (Ph.D. degree scholarship Jimena Rivera-Rea).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Posgrado en Ciencias Agropecuarias Y Recursos Naturales, Universidad Autónoma del Estado de México, Instituto Literario No, 100, Col. Centro, C.P. 50000, Toluca, Estado de México, Mexico

    Jimena Rivera-Rea

  2. Instituto para la Conservación de la Cordillera Neovolcánica ante el Cambio Climático A.C, Calle Lago Atitlán No. 502-B, C.P. 50100, Toluca, Estado de México, Mexico

    Jimena Rivera-Rea, J. Carlos González-Morales & Víctor Fajardo

  3. Centro Tlaxcala de Biología de la Conducta, Universidad Autónoma de Tlaxcala, Km 1.5 carretera Tlaxcala-Puebla s/n. AP 262, Tlaxcala, México

    J. Carlos González-Morales

  4. Facultad de Farmacia, Departamento de Biomedicina Y Biotecnología, Universidad de Alcalá, Área de Parasitología, 28805, Alcalá de Henares, Spain

    Rodrigo Megía-Palma

  5. CIBIO, InBIO – Research Network in Biodiversity and Evolutionary Biology, Universidade Do Porto, Campus de Vairão, Rua Padre Armando Quintas, 4485-661, Vairão, Portugal

    Rodrigo Megía-Palma

  6. Biology Department, State University of New York College at Oneonta, 108 Ravine Parkway, Oneonta, NY, 13820, USA

    Elizabeth Bastiaans

  7. Facultad de Ciencias, Universidad Autónoma del Estado de México, Toluca, México, Instituto Literario No, 100, Col. Centro, C.P. 50000, Toluca, Estado de México, Mexico

    Javier Manjarrez

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  1. Jimena Rivera-Rea
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Contributions

JRR, VF and JM designed research; JRR and JCGM performed research; JM and VF supervised project; JRR and RMP analyzed data; JRR, RMP, JCGM and VF wrote manuscript with contributions from JM and EB. All authors edited and approved the final manuscript.

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Correspondence to Víctor Fajardo.

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Rivera-Rea, J., González-Morales, J.C., Fajardo, V. et al. Phenological variation in parasite load and inflammatory response in a lizard with an asynchronous reproductive cycle. Sci Nat 109, 34 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00114-022-01793-x

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