01.04 – Parasitism

Episode description:

In this series on symbiosis, we’re taking a deep dive into the many different types of relationships organisms have evolved into, the good, the bad, the benign. This episode highlights relationships in which one partner’s a total dud: behold the neutral symbiont. The relationships can be the result of complete and totally unbalanced competition where the other symbiont is harmed (amensalism) or when one species exploits and is benefitted by the resources offered up by the other at no cost to the latter (commensalism: think dung beetles). No species is entirely isolated from the impact of another organism in its environment so we’ll talk about that gray space between commensalism and mutualism, amensalism and exploitation. Welcome to the Single Acorn.

WORKS CITED

• Mosquito repellents in frog skin (link)
• Fire Ant Project @ University of Texas at Austin (link)
• Red Queen Hypothesis (link)
• Oxpeckers as parasites (link)
• Studies on the Life History and Development of Cuterebra Polita (Diptera: Cuterebridae) in Four Species of Rodents (link)
• Why giardia makes your stools smell so bad (link)
• How Birds Combat Ectoparasites (link)
• Sea cucumbers (link)
• Bee Brains Hold Temp Steady to Slow Cook Wasps (link)
• Sacculina (link)
• Histology of the fusion area between the parasitic male and the female in the deep‐sea anglerfish Neoceratias spinifer Pappenheim, 1914 (Teleostei, Ceratioidei) (link)
• The Mentality of Crows: Convergent Evolution of Intelligence in Corvids and Apes (link)
• Cache protection strategies of a scatter-hoarding rodent: do tree squirrels engage in behavioural deception? (link)
• Cowbird name origins (link)
• Community-Wide Impacts of a Generalist Brood Parasite, the Brown-Headed Cowbird (Molothrus ater) (link)
• Tutelina similis (Araneae: Salticidae): An Ant Mimic That Feeds on Ants (link)