Seasonal diversity of metazoan parasites of Pseudocrenilabrus philander (Weber, 1897) from the middle Limpopo River basin
| Authors | |
|---|---|
| Year of publication | 2015 |
| Type | Conference abstract |
| MU Faculty or unit | |
| Citation | |
| Description | The importance of Pseudocrenilabrus philander (Weber, 1897) as an ornamental fish, has received attention due to its opalescence blue and pale yellow colour. This fish species is already utilized by subsistence fishermen in the Limpopo Province as an additional source of protein. Eighty-six specimens of P. philander (total length = 5.46 ± 0.99 cm) were collected during summer period in November 2013 and February 2014 and during winter in July and August 2014 from Nwanedi River (South Africa) and Bubi River (Zimbabwe), respectively. Fish were sacrificed by severing the spinal cord. All parasites found were isolated from different organs and fixed by appropriate methods. Parasites identification studying important structures and documentation were done using an Olympus BX50 microscope. Morphometric evaluations revealed the presence of six species of monogeneans, Enterogyrus coronatus, Cichlidogyrus tilapiae, Cichlidogyrus spp. and Gyrodactylogyrus sp.; three species of digenean metacercariae, Petasiger sp., Clinostomum sp. and Neodiplostomum sp.; eight species of cestode larvae Neogryporhynchus spp., Paradilepis scolecina, Paradilepis sp., Parvitaenia macropeos, Parvitaenia spp. and Valipora minuta; and L3 stage larvae of five nematode species, Procamallanus sp., Camallanus spp. and Contracaecum sp. NMDS was used to visualise the differences in the multivariate parasite species. PERMDISP and PERMANOVA pairwise tests showed significant difference in dispersion for parasite species in Bubi River (p=0.05, p=0.001) and a non-significant difference in Nwanedi River (p>0.05, p=0.004) for summer and winter. Many of the observations are first geographical and host records for both localities. |
| Related projects: |