Carl W Dick

Western Kentucky University | WKU · Department of Biology

Roughly a third of all horseshoe bat species (Rhinolophidae: Rhinolophus) are found in Africa, where a recent continent-wide genetic survey suggested the presence of both undescribed and apparently invalid species. Here, we focus on the R. landeri species complex and the recent elevation of R. lobatus Peters, 1852, to species rank. That action crea...

This paper describes and illustrates five new species of Gloeandromyces (Ascomycota, Laboulbeniales) associated with tropical American bat flies (Diptera, Streblidae). These are Gloeandromyces cusucoensis sp. nov. from Trichobius uniformis in Costa Rica and Honduras, G. diversiformis sp. nov. from Strebla wiedemanni in Costa Rica, G. plesiosaurus s...

Bat flies (Diptera: Nycteribiidae and Streblidae) are hematophagous ectoparasites of bats characterized by viviparous pupiparity and generally high host specificity. Nycteribiid bat flies are wingless, morphologically constrained, and are most diverse in the Eastern Hemisphere. Africa hosts approximately 22% of global bat biodiversity and nearly on...

Background The recognition and delineation of morphologically indistinguishable cryptic species can have broad implications for wildlife conservation, disease ecology and accurate estimates of biodiversity. Parasites are intriguing in the study of cryptic speciation because unique evolutionary pressures and diversifying factors are generated by eco...

Suitable habitat fragment size, isolation, and distance from a source are important variables influencing community composition of plants and animals, but the role of these environmental factors in determining composition and variation of host-associated microbial communities is poorly known. In parasite-associated microbial communities, it is hypo...

Suitable habitat fragment size, isolation, and distance from a source are important variables influencing community composition of plants and animals, but the role of these environmental factors in determining composition and variation of host-associated microbial communities is poorly known. In parasite-associated microbial communities, it is hypo...

Ecological specialization reflects both evolutionary and ecological processes. For parasitic taxa, ecological specialization can be assessed as the degree to which a parasite species will associate with certain host species, a property known as host specificity. Ectoparasitic bat flies have been previously reported as highly host specific, presumab...

Skin is the largest mammalian organ and the first defensive barrier against the external environment. The skin and fur of mammals can host a wide variety of ectoparasites, many of which are phylogenetically diverse, specialized, and specifically adapted to their hosts. Among hematophagous dipteran parasites, volatile organic compounds (VOCs) are kn...

Bats serve as hosts to many lineages of arthropods, of which the blood-sucking bat flies (Nycteribiidae and Streblidae) are the most conspicuous. Bat flies can in turn be parasitized by Laboulbeniales fungi, which are biotrophs of arthropods. This is a second level of parasitism, hyperparasitism, a severely understudied phenomenon. Four genera of L...

This paper describes and illustrates a new species of Laboulbeniales (Ascomycota, Laboulbeniomycetes) recovered from Mastoptera guimaraesi bat flies (Diptera, Streblidae) in Ecuador and Panama. Bat fly-associated Laboulbeniales are still unexplored in the Neotropics, with only four described species of Gloeandromyces and one species of Nycteromyces...

As an obligate ectoparasite of bats, the bat fly Trichobius frequens (Diptera: Streblidae) inhabits the same subterranean environment as their nocturnal bat hosts. In this study, we characterize the macromorphology, optical architecture, rhabdom anatomy, photoreceptor absorbance, and opsin expression of the significantly reduced visual system in T....

The aim of this study was to report on bat flies collected from a fruit bat (Rousettus aegyptiacus Geoffroy) which was found on the ground for an unknown reason, and was brought to a private veterinary clinic in Antalya. Bat flies on the bat that were brought to the clinic were sampled during examination of the bat. Fly samples were stored in glass...

The Systematic Collections Committee of the American Society of Mammalogists advises curators and other personnel affiliated with natural history collections in matters relating to administration, curation, and accreditation of mammal specimens and their associated data. The Systematic Collections Committee also maintains a list of curatorial stand...

Dispersal influences the evolution and adaptation of organisms, but it can be difficult to detect. Host-specific parasites provide information about the dispersal of their hosts and may be valuable for examining host dispersal that does not result in gene flow or that has low signals of gene flow. We examined the population connectivity of the buff...

We describe the echolocation calls of six species of Hipposideridae: Doryrhina camerunensis, Hipposideros beatus, H. caffer, H. ruber, Macronycteris gigas, and M. vittata and two species of Rhinonycteridae: Cloeotis percivali and Triaenops afer. The recordings were made in Kenya during 2013-2018, using Pettersson D500X and D1000X real time, full sp...

As a periodic assessment of the mammal collection resource, the Systematic Collections Committee (SCC) of the American Society of Mammalogists undertakes decadal surveys of the collections held in the Western Hemisphere. The SCC surveyed 429 collections and compiled a directory of 395 active collections containing 5,275,155 catalogued specimens. Ov...

Bats are parasitized by numerous lineages of arthropods, of which bat flies (Diptera, Nycteribiidae and Streblidae) are the most conspicuous. Bat flies themselves are often parasitized by Laboulbeniales, fungal biotrophs of arthropods. This is known as hyperparasitism, a severely understudied phenomenon. Three genera of Laboulbeniales occur on bat...

Background Free-tailed bats of the genus Otomops are poorly known, and most species are documented from a handful of widely scattered localities. Recently, two allopatric species of Otomops were recognized in continental Africa: Otomops martiensseni (Matschie, 1897) in southern, central and western Africa, and the new species O. harrisoni Ralph et...

Alignment of mitochondrial sequences for Otomops..

List of specimens used in mapping the distribution of Otomops. Specimen details, localities, and Genbank accession numbers of sampled individuals of Otomops: BMNH — Natural History Museum, London; DBN—Durban genetic samples; DM — Durban Natural Science Museum; FMNH — Field Museum of Natural History, Chicago; HZM — Harrison Zoological Museum, Seveno...

Alignment of concatenated mitochondrial and nuclear sequences for Otomops..

List of vocalizations recorded from hand-released Otomops..

List of specimens used in genetic analyses of Otomops.

List of ectoparasites recoved from Otomops harrisoni at the Mt. Suswa roost.

External measurements of Otomops specimens used in genetic analyses.

The incidence of tick-borne zoonoses such as Lyme disease has steadily increased in the southeastern United States. Southeastern states accounted for 1500 of over 28,000 confirmed cases of Lyme disease reported in the United States during 2015. Borrelia burgdorferi, the etiologic agent of Lyme disease, is maintained in small mammal reservoirs and v...

Study of all flies (Diptera) collected for one year from a four-hectare (150 x 266 meter) patch of cloud forest at 1,600 meters above sea level at Zurquí de Moravia, San José Province, Costa Rica (hereafter referred to as Zurquí), revealed an astounding 4,332 species. This amounts to more than half the number of named species of flies for all of Ce...

Estimations of tropical insect diversity generally suffer from lack of known groups or faunas against which extrapolations can be made, and have seriously underestimated the diversity of some taxa. Here we report the intensive inventory of a four-hectare tropical cloud forest in Costa Rica for one year, which yielded 4332 species of Diptera, provid...

Estimations of tropical insect diversity generally suffer from lack of known groups or faunas against which extrapolations can be made, and have seriously underestimated the diversity of some taxa. Here we report the intensive inventory of a four-hectare tropical cloud forest in Costa Rica for one year, which yielded 4332 species of Diptera, provid...

Background: We present information on Nycteribiidae flies parasitizing the bat families Pteropodidae, Miniopteridae and Vespertilionidae from the Malagasy Region, contributing insight into their diversity and host preference. Results: Our phylogenetic analysis identified nine clusters of nycteribiid bat flies on Madagascar and the neighbouring C...

J.L. Dunnum*, R.C. Dowler, and ASM Systematic Collections Committee (2017): ASM Systematic Collections Committee 2017 resurvey of the mammal collections of the western hemisphere. Poster presented at the 97th Annual Meeting of the American Society of Mammalogists, University of Idaho, Moscow, Idaho, EEUU.

The goal of this study was to elucidate the host - ectoparasite associations of small-mammal communities in south-central Kentucky. Specifically we sought to determine whether host species, sex, and age as well as site or season affected the infestation of small mammals by parasitic arthropods. We captured small mammals from November 2014 to Octobe...

Background: Bat flies (Streblidae and Nycteribiidae) are among the most specialized families of the order Diptera. Members of these two related families have an obligate ectoparasitic lifestyle on bats, and they are known disease vectors for their hosts. However, bat flies have their own ectoparasites: fungi of the order Laboulbeniales. In Europe,...

Bats (Chiroptera) sustain highly diverse communities of invertebrate parasites. Two families of flies (Diptera: Nycteribiidae and Streblidae) and one family of bugs (Heteroptera: Polyctenidae) are exclusively ectoparasitic on bats. Even before the order Laboulbeniales was first described, members of these peculiar fungi (described as worms at that...

This catalog presents eight species distributed among two genera and one subfamily of nycteribiid bat flies recorded in Colombia. For each genus we present synonymies and type species, and for each species account we present synonymies, disposition of type material, and specific localities and departments.

This catalog presents 73 species distributed among 19 genera and three subfamilies of streblid bat flies recorded in Colombia. For each genus we present synonymies and type species, and for each species account we present synonymies, type host, disposition of type material, and specific localities and departments for records known from Colombia.

Bats (Chiroptera) represent more than 20% of the known mammalian diversity, making them second only to Rodentia (Teeling et al., 2005; Wilson & Reeder, 2005). As bats were carving out their predominantly aerial and nocturnal niche, Diptera had long prevailed on Earth (origins: 260 mya) (Wiegmann et al., 2011). Among these were the ecologically high...

Herein we confirm the occurrence of Lophostoma carrikeri in Ecuador. One adult female was collected in Orellana province on 17 September 2012 at Boanamo, Waorani Ethnic Reserve, and another on 5 May 2013 at Yasuni Research Station, Yasuni National Park. These records extend the distributional range of the species about 570 km northwest of the neare...

Host specificity gauges the degree to which a parasite occurs in association with host species and is among the most fundamental properties of parasite–host associations. The degree of specificity is indicative of myriad properties of the host and parasite and of their ecological and evolutionary relationships. Bat flies are highly specialized bloo...

Bats and their parasites are increasingly investigated for their role in maintenance and transmission of potentially emerging pathogens. The islands of the western Indian Ocean hold nearly 50 bat species, mostly endemic and taxonomically well studied. However, investigation of associated viral, bacterial, and external parasites has lagged behind. I...

Population-level studies of parasites have the potential to elucidate patterns of host movement and cross-species interactions that are not evident from host genealogy alone. Bat flies are obligate and generally host-specific blood-feeding parasites of bats. Old-World flies in the family Nycteribiidae are entirely wingless and depend on their hosts...

Bat flies are a diverse clade of obligate ectoparasites on bats. Like most blood-feeding insects they harbor endosymbiotic prokaryotes, but the origins and nature of these symbioses are still poorly understood. To expand the knowledge of bacterial associates in bat flies, the diversity and evolution of the dominant endosymbionts in six of eight nom...

Streblid bat flies are obligate and host-specific blood-feeding ectoparasites of bats. While the bat flies of some American countries are well studied (e.g., Panama, Venezuela), little is known about Honduran Streblidae. Accumulation of substantial numbers of specimens, from several different collections, has enabled a relatively thorough treatment...

As part of the 65(th) Medical Brigade, U.S. Army, arthropod-borne disease surveillance program and in collaboration with the Korea National Institute of Biological Resources (NIBR), bats were captured from caves and abandoned mines in the Republic of Korea. A total of 39 adult bat flies including five species of Nycteribiidae [Penicillidia jenynsii...

We investigated previously unknown associations between bacterial endosymbionts and bat flies of the subfamily Nycterophiliinae (Diptera, Streblidae). Molecular analyses revealed a novel clade of Gammaproteobacteria in Nycterophilia bat flies. This clade was not closely related to Arsenophonus-like microbes found in its sister genus Phalconomus and...

Sequences were screened for chimeras by the submitter using QIIME 1.5.0.

Sequences were screened for chimeras by the submitter using QIIME 1.5.0.

Sequences were screened for chimeras by the submitter using QIIME 1.5.0.

Sequences were screened for chimeras by the submitter using QIIME 1.5.0.

Sequences were screened for chimeras by the submitter using QIIME 1.5.0.

Sequences were screened for chimeras by the submitter using QIIME 1.5.0.

Sequences were screened for chimeras by the submitter using QIIME 1.5.0.

Sequences were screened for chimeras by the submitter using QIIME 1.5.0.

Sequences were screened for chimeras by the submitter using QIIME 1.5.0.

Sequences were screened for chimeras by the submitter using QIIME 1.5.0.

Sequences were screened for chimeras by the submitter using QIIME 1.5.0.

Sequences were screened for chimeras by the submitter using QIIME 1.5.0.

Sequences were screened for chimeras by the submitter using QIIME 1.5.0.

Sequences were screened for chimeras by the submitter using QIIME 1.5.0.

Sequences were screened for chimeras by the submitter using QIIME 1.5.0.

Sequences were screened for chimeras by the submitter using QIIME 1.5.0.

Sequences were screened for chimeras by the submitter using QIIME 1.5.0.

Sequences were screened for chimeras by the submitter using QIIME 1.5.0.

Sequences were screened for chimeras by the submitter using QIIME 1.5.0.