Leucocytozoon otidis, Adlard & Peirce & Lederer, 2002

Adlard, R. D., Peirce, M. A. & Lederer, R., 2002, New species of Leucocytozoon from the avian families Otidae, Podargidae and Threskiornithidae, Journal of Natural History 36 (11), pp. 1261-1267 : 1266

Leucocytozoon otidis n. sp.

(gures 7, 8)

Type host. Ardeotis kori Burchell (Kori bustard).

Type locality. Kajiado, Kenya .

Basis of description

Macrogametocyte. A small parasite with round morphs only, with a diameter of about 14 m m ( table 1), exhibiting the usual staining characteristics. The cytoplasm is granular with the presence of numerous small hyaline vacuoles; nucleus is central to sub-central, round to oval in shape with a distinctive dark staining karyosome (gures 7, 8). The host–parasite complex has an overall length of about 16 m m and the host cell nucleus forms a cap on the periphery of the parasite covering between a quarter and a third of the circumference (gures 7, 8).

Microgametocyte. Similar to the macrogametocyt e with the usual diOEerentiating staining characteristics. The prevalence of microgametocytes is low and the ratio to macrogametocytes is 1:25.

Hapantotype. IRCAH:G46310 3 from Ardeotis kori , coll. Joyner, 18 March 1967, Kajiado, Kenya .

Parahapantotypes. IRCAH:G46310 4 and G463105 from Clamydotis undulata (Jacquin), coll. Silvanose, 7 June 1999, Abu Dhabi, UAE (birds imported from Pakistan) .

Other hosts. There are records of Leucocytozoon from several species of Otidae in the IRCAH database ( Bennett et al., 1982; Bishop and Bennett, 1992), but no slides were available for study. It is assumed that all records can be referred to L. otidis .

Vectors. Unknown, but assumed to be simuliids.

Etymology. Named after the host family.

Comments. Leucocytozoon otidis is a relatively small round morph and is considered to be a distinct species based on assumed host-speci city at the family/subfamily level ( Bennett et al., 1991). The Otidae have a wide distribution throughout Europe, Africa and Asia and it is likely that L. otidis occurs throughout this range. Bustards generally inhabit dry bushland and savannah which probably accounts for the apparent low prevalence of L. otidis as the vectors would be sparse in such areas.