Infestation with the parasitic nematode Emphasis

Authors: YiTe Lai Jukka Kekäläinen Raine Kortet

Publish Date: 2015/12/15

Volume: 19, Issue: 2, Pages: 103-111

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Abstract

Our understanding on the role of chemical signals in parasitemediated sexual selection is still limited and only some existing studies have focused on fish Furthermore published studies on the effect of parasite infection on behavioral sexual competition of the male hosts have yielded contradictory results Here we examined whether the infection of the body cavitydwelling parasitic nematode Philometra ovata influences odorbased female choice and behavioral sexual competition dominance and courtship behavior between males in the European minnow Phoxinus phoxinus the cyprinid fish host In contrast to our predictions we found that naïve females showed no preference between the odors of infected and noninfected males thus indicating that P ovata infection may not affect odorbased female choice Moreover P ovata did not impair sexual competitiveness of their hosts either Our results indicate that despite its relatively large size P ovata may not alter sexual cues and the success of the male hosts in sexual selectionWe thank Elli Jelkänen Ilkka Sirkka Matti Heep and Minttu Kivi for their help in the field and lab We also thank Jouni Taskinen and Antti Oksanen for the inspiring discussions We also thank the referees for their constructive comments in improving our manuscript This study was financially supported by Emil Aaltonen Foundation YTL grant number 61507913 North Carelia regional fund of Finnish Cultural Foundation YTL grant numbers 77138–15725 and 94513–13416 and Kone foundation through Finnish PostDoc Pool JK

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