From the host's point of view: Effects of variation in burying beetle brood care and brood size on the interaction with parasitic mites.

ABSTRACT: The fitness and virulence of parasites is often determined by how many resources they can wrangle out of their hosts. Host defenses that help to keep resources from the parasites will then reduce virulence and parasite fitness. Here, we study whether host brood care and brood size regulation can protect host fitness and harm a parasite. We use the biparental brood-caring burying beetle Nicrophorus vespilloides and its phoretic Poecilochirus carabi mites as a model. Since paternal brood care does not seem to benefit the offspring in a clean laboratory setting, the male presence has been suggested to strengthen the defense against parasites. We manipulated male presence and found no effect on the fitness of the parasitic mites or the beetle offspring. We further manipulated beetle brood size

SUBMITTER: Schedwill P 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6974135 | biostudies-literature | 2020

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature