Even nonpathogenic immune system challenges can induce dramatic changes in traits as diverse as metabolic rate, competing immune function, food consumption, offspring feeding rate and reproductive output (Minchella & Loverde 1981;Adamo 1999;Lochmiller & Deerenberg 2000;Zuk & Stoehr 2002;Martin et al. assessed with giving-up densities of seed at artificial feeding stations was affected by exposure to the immunogen. Whereas immunochallenge did not influence whether foraging mice gained information on patch quality while foraging, it led to reductions in predator avoidance during foraging, suggesting that this proportion of space used by foraging mice may be greater as a result TCS 5861528 of immunochallenge. This increased space use is usually predicted to increase encounter rates with patchily distributed LD vectors (ticks) and with incidental prey items. 6.Thus, immunochallenge in white-footed mice, and potentially pathogenic infection, have the potential to indirectly impact community interactions, including those important for pathogen transmission. Keywords:behavioural indicators, black-legged tick,Borrelia burgdorferi, GUDs, gypsy moth, indirect community effect,Ixodes scapularis, lyme disease ecology, quitting harvest rate == TCS 5861528 Introduction == Pathogen avoidance and investment in immune function TCS 5861528 are vital components of host evolutionary ecology (Sheldon & Verhulst 1996;Lochmiller & Deerenberg 2000;Zuk & Stoehr 2002;Lee 2006). Even nonpathogenic immune challenges can induce dramatic changes in traits as diverse as metabolic rate, competing immune function, food consumption, offspring feeding rate and reproductive output (Minchella & Loverde 1981;Adamo 1999;Lochmiller & Deerenberg 2000;Zuk & Stoehr 2002;Martin et al. 2006;Uller, Isaksson & Olsson 2006;Velando, Drummond & Torres 2006). In addition, these responses can potentially impact population dynamics and have cascading effects in community ecology through direct and indirect pathways (Anderson & May 1979;May & Anderson 1979;Dobson 1988;McCallum & Dobson 1995;Lafferty, Dobson & Kuris 2006;Collinge, Ray & Cully 2008;Lafferty 2008;Pederson & Grieves 2008). In particular, changes in host phenotype that alter population demographics and pathogen transmission rates could affect disease epidemiology. In addition, population regulation by pathogens can indirectly impact other community members through altered predatory or competitive interactions (Lafferty, Dobson & Rabbit Polyclonal to PITPNB Kuris 2006;Collinge, Ray & Cully 2008;Lafferty 2008). While appreciation has grown in the last decade for the indirect effects of host population regulation by pathogens, little is known about how pathogen-induced alterations ofindividualhost phenotype (e.g. behaviour) impact community ecology, including interactions between hosts and pathogens. Space-use and foraging behaviour of animals reflect individual condition and behavioural motivation and can have extensive indirect impact on community ecology (e.g.Brown 1988;Schmidt 2004;Brown & Kotler 2007;Kotler & Brown 2007;Schmidt & Schauber 2007). For example, the quitting harvest rate (QHR) of a foraging animal is theorized to provide information around the energetic cost of foraging, missed opportunity costs and instantaneous predation risk (Brown 1988,1992;Brown & Kotler 2007). If a forager has perfect information on patch quality, it will harvest patches of different quality to the same QHR in a density-dependent fashion (Valone & Brown 1989). In addition, QHR has immediate relevance for community ecology because it reflects the proportion of a home range used by a forager (restricted to profitable space). Specifically, a higher QHR indicates that an animal forages only in high-quality patches (high density of primary prey items), ignores low-quality patches, and thus uses a smaller proportion of its home range for foraging. This leads to a reduced encounter rate with patchily distributed incidental prey as many prey go undiscovered in otherwise poor-quality patches (Schmidt, Goheen & Naumann 2001;Schmidt & Ostfeld 2003a;Schmidt 2004). Pathogens and immune challenges may influence QHR if metabolic costs of immune response alter the energetic costs of foraging. If pathogen exposure leads to altered host life-history strategies (e.g. reproductive suppression or terminal investment;Forbes 1993;Clutton-Brock 1984), the missed reproductive opportunities costs would differ between exposed and unexposed individuals. With respect to the cost of predation, animals in good condition are predicted to avoid.