Prevalence of Plasmodium spp. in northern Michigan

Abstract

Prevalences of passerine malaria were compared at the maple river MAPS site this year to that recorded two years ago in the same site. To identify this apicomplexan, birds were caught in mist nets and blood smears were taken from them, which were then stained and viewed under a microscope in 100x oil immersion. Of 44 passerines, two birds infected with Plasmodium sp. were found. These data were compared to the seventeen infected birds in 159 caught from the study in 2006. A Chi-squared test revealed that there was no significant change in the malaria prevalence in passerines at the Maple River site and furthermore that a larger sample size and better malaria detection methods ought to be used in the future.