Spiroxys, Schneider, 1866

Aguiar, Aline, Morais, Drausio Honorio, Firmino Silva, Lidiane A., Anjos, Luciano Alves Dos, Foster, Ottilie Carolina & Silva, Reinaldo José Da, 2021, Biodiversity of anuran endoparasites from a transitional area between the Atlantic Forest and Cerrado biomes in Brazil: new records and remarks, Zootaxa 4948 (1), pp. 1-41 : 15

Spiroxys sp.

Hosts (prevalence; range): S. fuscovarius (1/51; 1) and S. cf. similis (1/2; 1).

Site of infection: mesentery and stomach wall.

Stage: cyst.

Type host and type locality: not informed.

Comments: infective larvae of Spiroxys are found as cysts in tissues of amphibians which act as paratenic hosts ( Anderson 2000). Adult nematodes of this genus are found in the digestive tract of freshwater turtles and the larvae reach the external environment by the feces and they use copepod as an intermediate host ( Anderson 2000). These larvae are identified mainly by characteristics of large lateral triangular pseudolabia and two cephalic papillae and one small amphid on either side ( González & Hamann 2010b). Moreover, we also verified other structures such as cuticle transversally striated, esophagus divided into two parts (the anterior is narrow and muscular; the posterior is broader and glandular) and a conic tail with rounded tip ( Moravec et al. 1995; González & Hamann 2010b). Specific identification of immature nematodes is hindered based only on morphologic analyses because the larvae of different species share several characters. Spiroxys sp. has been recorded in P. platensis and P. albonotatus from Argentina (see Campi„o et al. 2014) and in Pseudopaludicola pocoto Magalh „es, Loebmann, Kokubum, Haddad & Garda from northeastern Brazil ( Silva et al. 2018). Scinax fuscovarius and S. cf. similis are new hosts for Spiroxys sp.