Dracunculus spp

Cleveland, Christopher A., Garrett, Kayla B., Cozad, Rebecca A., Williams, Brianna M., Murray, Maureen H. & Yabsley, Michael J., 2018, The wild world of Guinea Worms: A review of the genus Dracunculus in wildlife, International Journal for Parasitology: Parasites and Wildlife 7 (3), pp. 289-300 : 295

2.2. Intermediate and paratenic hosts of sqaumate Dracunculus spp .

As in experimental infection trials with other Dracunculus species, copepods have been used as experimental intermediate hosts ( Brackett, 1938; Muller, 1971) ( Table 1). Emergence of adult female nematodes from snake hosts has rarely been reported; however, adult females are present in subcutaneous masses and Brackett reported that gravid D. ophidensis responded to water in the same manner as D. medinensis . Therefore, it is likely that transmission to copepods is similar to the mammalian Dracunculus spp . ( Brackett, 1938). Experimentally, an undescribed Dracunculus sp. detected in boas from Trinidad developed in C. vernalis to the infective third stage larvae in 12–14 days at 25 ̊C and D. doi developed to L 3 in Cyclops strenuus in 13 days at 22–25 ̊C, thus development appears to be similar to that of mammalian Dracunculus spp . (Muller, 1971; Vaucher and Bain, 1973).

Experimental studies show that paratenic amphibian hosts may be involved in the life cycle of some squamate Dracunculus species. Copepods infected with D. ophidensis were readily ingested by tadpoles of an unreported frog species and larvae were noted in the tadpole body cavity ( Brackett, 1938). Feeding of these tadpoles to two garter snakes and a water snake ( N. sipidon ) resulted in infection of one snake of each species ( Brackett, 1938). However, there have been no reports of natural infections in aquatic paratenic hosts.