Avian malaria and song performance of the cerulean warbler (setophaga cerulea)
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Abstract
Avian malaria (haemosporidians), commonly infect terrestrial birds worldwide and can have negative consequences for individuals. There is also considerable genetic diversity among these parasites, which presents a challenge in understanding speciation, geographic distributions, and host-parasite relationships. I studied avian haemosporidian infections in a Southern Indiana breeding population of Cerulean Warbler (Setophaga cerulea; n = 51) over two years using traditional microscopy and standard molecular methods. I aimed to provide the first documentation of haemosporidian mitochondrial cytochrome-b lineages for the species and estimate population prevalence and parasitemia rates for comparison with earlier studies of the species. Also, I investigated host specificity and geographic distributions of lineages, and potential effects of infection on individual health. Prevalence was 31.4% across both years and I documented 11 unique lineages in the genera Haemoproteus and Plasmodium, two of which were novel. Parasitemia was low (<1% of cells infected) for most individuals, indicative of chronic infections, and was not associated with haemosporidian genus. I did not find any negative effects of infection on body mass of males (n = 49); however, body mass of infected individuals was significantly higher, which could reflect survivorship bias in the population. Finally, host specificity did not vary by genus, and for some lineages I inferred likely geographic regions of transmission to Neotropical-Nearctic migrants, including the Cerulean Warbler. These findings advance knowledge of host-parasite interactions for a declining avian species and add to the broader field of avian haemosporidian biology.