Question

In the literature you become aware of a pattern in parasite infections of birds and fish. While exceptions exist, birds tend to have more diverse helminth communities and greater abundance of parasites than fish. You seek for an explanation. In a eureka moment, you believe it is due to ????? What features do you believe contribute to this pattern.

Answer 1

The simple reason for this could be –

host phylogeny, vagility, habitat, and diet

Birds continuously interact with various spheres of atmosphere such as geosphere (land), hydrosphere (water/aquatic) and air as a part of atmosphere. They consume variety of food including the fishes itself.

Also birds migrate from one place to other thereby getting exposure to wide array of parasites.