Talk:Parasitoid/Archive 1

Archive 1

Untitled

Added couple of sentences to section on parasitoidal insects. NK2015 (talk) 12:45, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

Nectrophs?

I agree with Million Moments in the third comment. Necrotrophs are more pathogenic then parasitic. A parasite implies that it needs its host alive, even if the parasitism (like parasitoids) is fatal. Necrotrophs really don't care if their host is living or dead, however a living host is treated very differently from a dead one (induced pathogenic state). Necrotrophs seem too different from parasitoids to be included here. (Psychro 06:41, 28 February 2007 (UTC))

Expert

Following some of the discussion below - it seems quite plain that while well-intentioned and in some places even well referenced, this article was not written by anyone with learning in the biosciences - it is rife with anthropomorphic language which does not suggest the reading of a rather specialized evolutionary biology and animal behavior piece. It also makes implicit assumptions about definitions, such as referring to the rabies virus firstly as a parasite (viruses are not traditionally considered to be parasites in either Medicine or Biology), and secondly implying that it 'eats,' as in feeds upon, the host, which is not at all the morphological or definitional criteria of viruses.

There are other article issues but, they seem pointless to recount in number as an expert re-write would probably repair all of them. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.97.89.50 (talk) 04:00, 10 October 2012 (UTC)

---

The part about the difference between parasites and parasitoids says that parasites cause little or no damage while benefiting from the host. Isn't that commensalism? I seem to remember from biology class that parasitism definitely involves harm to the host.

The emphasis is off, but not as far as it sounds. Parasitoids kill their hosts, parasites usually don't. For most parasites, a single one, does almost negiligible harm. A single flea or tick doesn't do much damage at all to a dog (sometimes they carry disease, but that's just a transmission thing, it' snot a direct effect). A parasitoid, if successful, will always kill it's host (and often cunsume most of its body in the process. The "or no" part of the definition should maybe go, since I suspect any parasites which cause absolutely no harm are rare exception. Also, I don't think the article should start with what they are not. I'll take a shot at cleaining it up. Jmeppley 05:28, 2 April 2006 (UTC)

Expert tag

I put up the expert tag (didn't get time to finish my edit summary unfortunately, as I pressed the enter button by error) because I am a bit confused. There seems to be 2 definitions of a parasitoid : a parasite that kills its host (isn't that a necrotrophic parasite?) and an animal (usually an insect) that lays its egg in or near a host, either already dead or alive, in which the larvae develops until adulthood. This last definition seems to be the most widespread ([1], [2], [3], [4], [5], etc.).

It is clear that any necrotrophic parasite kills its host (by definition), which makes this article seem contradictory and confusing. Also, "the host is killed before it can reproduce'?? I need a citation here, because I doubt that very much, and if needed there are plenty of examples that go against this (the emerald cockroach wasp for one).

Maybe both definitions are acceptable, but it would be great if someone could explain the difference between a necrotrophic parasite and a parasitoid, and make it clear that this term refers to two concepts : a parasite that kills its host and an animal that lives as an endoparasite during its larval stage but is free-living as an adult (mainly parasitic wasps and flies). IronChris | (talk) 23:40, 7 May 2006 (UTC)

Removal of expert tag. Unfortunately IronChris seems to have dropped out of WP activity (welcome back if I am behind the times in this assumption, Chris!) So I couldn't discuss it with him before removing the tag. Not that on one hand I think the tag was the right response, nor that I have any objection to the idea of an expert looking in (much the contrary) but I think that the substance of Chris's complaint was rather based on his own misunderstanding (at the time of his writing, he might know better now) of necro- and biotrophy, and the distinction between parasitism and parasitoidy. I may get round to proper article on necro- and biotrophy, or not (the current redirs are pretty useless), but they don't mean what Chris seemed to think. Meanwhile I am only too happy to discuss either the tag or any part of the article(s) with anyone interested. JonRichfield (talk) 14:27, 31 March 2013 (UTC)

Plant Pathology

In plant pathology a necrotroph refers to a specific form of plant pathogen, either fungal or bacterial, that attacks the plant by killing cells and living off the nutrients realised. The opposite is a biotroph which keeps cells alive. Perhaps a separate article is needed for necrotroph giving this definition. (a Mentally Efficient Loonies And Nice Insane Elephants creation 18:35, 19 January 2007 (UTC))

Hyperparasite

The term "hyperparasite" should not redirect to parasitoid because they are two completely different things.

As noted in the article, a parasitoid is a parasite that kills it's host, but a hyperparasite is a parasite that lives off other parasites.

The redirect is wrong. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Daecon (talk • contribs) 23:30, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

Dunno about the redirect, but a hyperparasite may or may not be a parasitoid (hyperparasitoid, if you want to be picky). The fact that your host is a parasite(-itoid) does not mean that you are anything but a parasite(-itoid). The hyper- part refers rather to your ecology than to the relationship of your host with its host. JonRichfield (talk) 12:00, 10 October 2012 (UTC)

In fiction

This section describes several examples of parasites in fiction but only a few Parasitoid. Perhaps it should be moved to the parasitism article. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parasite Donhoraldo (talk) 19:29, 14 July 2010 (UTC)

The Alien [from the Alien series of films] was mentioned twice, once as Alien and once as Xenomoroph, i have removed the unnecessary second mention —Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.15.38.177 (talk) 01:25, 17 July 2010 (UTC)

Pronunciation

Could someone that knows add the correct pronunciation, I don't know it. I would think, para sit oid, but it could be para sight oid.Carlwev (talk) 06:56, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

The term parasitoid is a comparatively new one, having been coined less than a century ago. I do not think there is any cogent basis for any specific pronunciation, but I have never pronounced it other than the way you suggested, nor heard anyone else do so. I checked in Merriam Webster, and though their definition was unsound, they did used something like that pronunciation as well: ˈper-ə-sə-ˌtȯid. So they are not all wrong. I wrote to correct their definition, and no doubt they will spring into action. JonRichfield (talk) 13:31, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

hard to read

the article would be easier to read if it were re-organized and some of the redundancy removed. Decora (talk) 12:32, 5 August 2012 (UTC)

Chrysomelid larva picture misinterpreted

On this page there is a picture labelled "Larva of beetle in the family Chrysomelidae consumed from within by polyembryonic Hymenopteran parasitoid larvae". This picture was used, and then removed, from the Wikipedia page entitled "Parasitoid wasps". The same comment can be made for the use of this picture here.Entomologger (talk) 21:07, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

Why does "superparasite" redirect here?

Not used or explained in article. 86.159.197.174 (talk) 17:54, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

Biological pest control

I was surprised to see no mention of biological control in this article, except for a correct category link. It deserves a section and a main link, surely. Chiswick Chap (talk) 07:15, 14 June 2016 (UTC)

needs clean up

This article needs some work. The parasitoid wasp oviposition section should be removed or incorporated into the parasitoid wasp page. The definition of parasitoid needs to be clarified and examples that do not meet that should be removed (parasites that sometimes cause the death of their hosts). A distinction between facultatively and obligately killing the host should be made. I may make these changes if no one else gets back to me on this. Zelomorpha (talk) 23:24, 14 June 2017 (UTC)

Well, yes. However, parasitoid wasps certainly deserves a section here, given the prominence of this group of parasitoids and their remarkable degree of adaptation to this way of life. The image of Megarhyssa macrurus is arguably the best illustration in the article and is undoubtedly highly relevant here. The section is however overlong, poorly written, and you're right, its author gave no thought to how it should fit into this article, so it needs to be adapted (and the parasitoid wasp article needs serious work, too). On the other points I agree, the article needs focus, and the facultative/obligate killing distinction needs to be mentioned explicitly. The article's citations need improvement, too, and as you were perhaps implying, some of the more 'student' sections need cleaning up with copy-editing and wikilinking. I've made a start. Chiswick Chap (talk) 04:24, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

In culture

Animals and their behaviour play an important role in culture, as summarized in articles such as Animals in culture. Brief mentions of the roles played by individual taxa and specific behaviours such as parasitoidy are provided in the articles concerned. An overview is provided in the navigation template Template:Living things in culture, showing the breadth (and something of the depth) of the topic. The current article fits into this larger picture. Chiswick Chap (talk) 10:49, 30 November 2017 (UTC)

(moved from personal talk page)

Lgnlint I removed the science fiction references from the parasitoid article because they were little snippets added to both the end of the lede and end of the article itself. The entire article focuses on parasitoids as they exist in nature, and the added sci-fi information is extremely out of place. The actual section on parasitoids in sci-fi is just a run-on description of a scene from the movie Alien and reads almost like a kid describing some event "and then, and then, and then...". In fact, Alien is the only reference included. It's nearly irrelevant information tacked onto the end, and a very small amount of irrelevant information at that. It adds nothing of value to the article, and in my opinion actually cheapens the article. You must be able to see how out of place it is and how jarring the shift in tone is, can't you? Please, let the article stand as it is about actual parasitoids. It doesn't need a description of a scene from Alien at the very end for no apparent reason. Lgnlint (talk) 12:57, 30 November 2017 (UTC)

And one thing I forgot to add to my reasoning for removing it was that a semi in-depth description of how the special effects of an alien bursting from a man in Alien has nothing at all to do with parasitoids. It would be better suited for the article about the movie Alien. Lgnlint (talk) 13:05, 30 November 2017 (UTC)

First, thank you for replying. Second, the article ought, while discussion is in progress, to have been left in its original state. Third, I would be grateful if, before you read on, you read my original reply at the top of this discussion thread, as I believe you hadn't seen it.

Now, to reply to your comments and opinions: I think "little snippets" is unreasonable. The mention in the lead must necessarily be brief: its function (as for leads generally) is to summarize the argument in the article body, which it does. The paragraph in the article, cited and illustrated, is by no means a snippet, though I'm happy to substantiate it, and not at all out of place: we normally have an 'in culture' section at the end. I disagree completely with accusations of "run-on", nor is that in any case grounds for removal but for copy-editing, were the accusation correct. It absolutely adds value to the article, showing that the idea of the parasitoid has a wider extension than biology. The mention of Alien is for a good reason, namely that it is an extremely well-known scene which has passed into Western culture and has been widely commented on by critics. The movie article of course discusses the alien creatures, but that is not our concern here. The use of a parasitoid in the Alien films is directly relevant to this article, parasitoid: we have an alien life-form that grows parasitically inside a human, and emerges, causing the human's death, in exact analogy with parasitoids, as both scientists and critics have noted. Nothing could be more apposite for the article. I am happy to check the wording and to add instances of critical commentary since those seem to be necessary. I do not know why you should have taken against this cultural section, but if you supposed it to be a random drive-by addition, I can assure you it wasn't. Chiswick Chap (talk) 14:11, 30 November 2017 (UTC)

I have rewritten the section at greater depth, naming and citing a selection of critics and scientists who have discussed the topic. I hope this answers any doubts people may have had about the topic's interest and relevance; the template gives further clues as to the importance of animal behaviour in culture. I'm happy to discuss further and would welcome constructive suggestions for the improvement of any part of the article, including the cultural relevance of the topic. Chiswick Chap (talk) 15:16, 30 November 2017 (UTC)

I would probably not support a list of random trivia, but I agree that Alien is most notable in culture; it seems that enough people wrote about it for it to be covered. I like the article, it covers wasps and phoridae which were the two that I immediately remembered when thinking of parasitoids. —PaleoNeonate – 10:41, 2 December 2017 (UTC)

Many thanks. With Darwin and the well-cited section on the use in film we're very far from that here. Chiswick Chap (talk) 10:47, 2 December 2017 (UTC)

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