Jenella Loye and Scott Carroll are at the Dept of Entomology and Center for Population Biology, University of California, Davis, CA 95616, USA.
Trends Ecol Evol. 1995 Jun;10(6):232-5. doi: 10.1016/S0169-5347(00)89072-2.
Parasitism has far-reaching implications not only for the ecology and evolution of species but also for conservation. The effects of blood-feeding ectoparasites on colonially nesting bird species have been wodely studied, but recent surprising reports show that solitarily nesting species are also commonly attacked, mainly by the larvae of flies. Most bird species are solitary nesters; as their habitats are increasingly fragmented, how will the potential for such parasitism be affected? One example is that of the endangered Puerto Rican parrot (Amazona vittata), in which habitat changes have introduced a deadly parasitic fly species in a complex and unpredicted manner. As theories on habitat fragmentation outpace the data, we need to carry out more field studies of the interactions between fragmentation and parasitism, and to include parasitism in species survival and recovery plans.
寄生虫对物种的生态和进化有着深远的影响，对保护也有影响。吸血外寄生虫对群体筑巢的鸟类的影响已经被广泛研究，但最近令人惊讶的报告显示，独居筑巢的鸟类也经常受到攻击，主要是由苍蝇的幼虫引起的。大多数鸟类都是独居筑巢者；随着它们的栖息地日益碎片化，这种寄生虫的潜在威胁将会受到怎样的影响？一个例子是濒危的波多黎各鹦鹉（Amazona vittata），其栖息地的变化以复杂且难以预测的方式引入了一种致命的寄生蝇。由于关于栖息地碎片化的理论比数据发展得更快，我们需要对碎片化和寄生虫之间的相互作用进行更多的实地研究，并在物种生存和恢复计划中纳入寄生虫。
