Food supplementation leads to bottom-up and top-down food-host-parasite interactions

The Journal of Animal Ecology
Liana Zanette, Michael Clinchy

Abstract

1. Food-prey-predator interactions may involve both 'bottom-up' and 'top-down' processes. Conventionally, food-host-parasite interactions have been seen as governed solely from the 'bottom-up', i.e. well-fed hosts can better resist parasites and so suffer less parasitism. Recent studies on diverse endo- and ecto-parasites increasingly highlight that well-fed hosts provide parasites with a better resource base, and so may be more likely to be parasitized. 2. Brood parasites exploit host parental behaviour by laying their eggs in others' nests. The brown-headed cowbird (Molothrus ater) is a North American brood parasite that exploits over 100 host species. 3. We conducted a food addition experiment on song sparrows (Melospiza melodia), a frequently parasitized cowbird host, near Victoria, BC, Canada. We expected results consistent with conventional 'bottom-up' effects because we previously found that food supplemented sparrows better eluded nest predation, and we thus also expected them to be better at eluding cowbird parasitism. 4. Here, we report results to the contrary. Food supplemented sparrows were parasitized as often as non-food supplemented sparrows, were multiply parasitized significantly more often, and suffered signif...Continue Reading

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May 22, 2009·Proceedings. Biological Sciences·Liana ZanetteHa-Cheol Sung

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Citations

Apr 15, 2014·Hormones and Behavior·Scott Davies, Pierre Deviche

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