Direct measurement of fight or flight behavior in a beetle reveals individual variation and the influence of parasitism.

ABSTRACT: How and to what degree an animal deals with potential threats is a fascinating topic that has been well-researched, particularly in insects, though usually not with the impact of parasites in mind. A growing body of work is showing how even benign parasites can affect, positively or negatively, their hosts' physiological or behavioral reaction to threats. With this in mind we conducted an experiment using horned passalus beetles, Odontotaenius disjunctus that were naturally parasitized with a nematode Chondronema passali; we subjected beetles to simulated attacks (resembling rival fighting or predator attacks) and from videos of the encounters we quantified a suite of behaviors (antennae movement, aggressive posturing, threat displays, etc.), plus rates of alarm calls (stridulations) which

SUBMITTER: Ebot-Ojong F 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6530861 | biostudies-literature | 2019

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature