Social trematode parasites increase standing army size in areas of greater invasion threat.

ABSTRACT: Organisms or societies are resource limited, causing important trade-offs between reproduction and defence. Given such trade-offs, optimal allocation theory predicts that, for animal societies with a soldier caste, allocation to soldiers should reflect local external threats. Although both threat intensity and soldier allocation can vary widely in nature, we currently lack strong evidence that spatial variation in threat can drive the corresponding variation in soldier allocation. The diverse guild of trematode parasites of the California horn snail provides a useful system to address this problem. Several of these species form colonies in their hosts with a reproductive division of labour including a soldier caste. Soldiers are non-reproductive and specialized in defence, attacking and ki

SUBMITTER: Resetarits EJ 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7058954 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature