Parasite of the Day

There is no parasite that is universally infective, even generalist parasites that can infect many different host species are usually limite...

image from here In the last post we met Acanthocephalus rhinensis - an acanthocephalan which lives a pretty normal life (for a thorny-...

image from figure 1 of the paper The study which forms the basis of today's post features an acanthocephalan - also known as a thor...

On this blog, we have featured many parasites that drastically alter the appearance and/or behaviour of their host, usually to make them mo...

We have featured many parasitic flukes on this blog, and a part of their life-cycle consists of the free-living stage (called a cercaria...

Today's post has some plant-on-plant action, featuring a species of dodder. Dodders are a group of holoparasitic plants made up of abou...

Sex is one of the great mysteries of evolutionary biology - why do organisms have it? It has numerous costs associated with it, including t...

For many parasites, host castration is a very effective strategy. By specifically diverting energy from the host's reproductive function...

Most animals are infected by multiple species of parasites or multiple strains of the same parasite species that are not close kin . Rarely ...

Today's parasite and host are found among the dunes on the coast of Waldport, Oregon. In this story, the host is a little bug - and by b...