Haemoproteus of Pigeons — KARTMAN 
129 
TABLE 2 
Infection of Pigeons and Doves with Haemoproteus columbae in Nature 
DATE 
BIRD 
NUMBER 
EXAMINED 
NUMBER 
POSITIVE 
PERCENTAGE 
POSITIVE 
1-20-48 
Pigeon 
3 
3 
100.0 
2-23-48.. 
Pigeon 
28 
20 
71.4 
2-25-48 
Pigeon 
45 
42 
93.3 
2-26-48.—* * 
Pigeon 
25 
18 
72.0 
3-30-48 
Dove* 
43 
0 
0.0 
Totals (Pigeons only) 
101 
83 
82.2 
* Thirty Indian ring-neck doves and 13 lace-neck doves. 
blood parasites. The remaining five flies not placed 
on the dove were dissected and four were found to 
have oocysts on the midgut. Salivary gland exami- 
nations were not made. 
( 3 ) . Blood smears taken on March 1 2 and 1 6 
were negative and on March 29 the dove was found 
dead in its cage. Blood smears from the heart and 
liver were negative for Haemoproteus gametocytes. 
(4) . Five flies were recovered from the cage con- 
taining the dead dove and dissections of these showed 
two with both oocysts and sporozoites, one with 
oocysts only, and two with negative midguts and 
salivary glands. 
Experiment 11: (1). On May 12, pigeon flies were 
collected from juvenile pigeons. Of three flies dis- 
sected, one was positive for sporozoites. Fifteen flies 
were comminuted with physiological saline in a 
mortar, yielding 1.5 ml. of pooled material. Approxi- 
mately 0.5 ml. was injected into the pectoral muscles 
of one ring-neck dove, Streptopelia decaocto (Pri- 
valszky), one barred dove, Geopelia striata striata 
(Linn.), and one 5-week-old white Leghorn chick. 
(2). Blood smears taken from these birds on June 
8, 17, and July 2 were all negative and the experi- 
ment was terminated. 
Experiment 111: (1). On May 12, 10 pigeon flies 
were placed on an infected pigeon showing 250 game- 
tocytes per 10,000 red cells. 
(2) . On May 22 the flies were removed from the 
pigeon and placed on a ring-neck dove. Two flies 
dissected were found positive for oocysts. 
(3) . Blood smears taken on June 17 and July 4 
were negative. Six flies taken from the dove on July 
4 showed four positive for sporozoites. 
All the doves were examined well within the 
period shown by Adie (1924) to be necessary 
for the appearance of gametocytes in the peri- 
pheral blood. Even in the case of the dove in 
Experiment I a period of 30 days intervened 
between first feeding of the flies and death of 
the bird. Since infected flies were known to 
be present in these samples and since the flies 
feed on their host every day, it is felt that the 
doves had ample opportunity to become in- 
fected. 
The failure to infect these doves and the 
chicken with the Haemoproteus from the 
pigeon substantiates the findings of Coatney 
(1933), who showed that the mourning dove, 
Zenaidura macroura carolinensis, is not suscep- 
tible to Haemoproteus columbae of the pigeon. 
He ascribes this to the known high degree of 
host specificity among many of the Haemos- 
poridia and concludes that doves have a high 
degree of natural immunity toward the pigeon 
Haemoproteus. 
Although earlier in this paper it was indi- 
cated that the pigeon fly was not taken on doves 
in nature, no difficulty was encountered in using 
the doves as hosts of this vector in the labora- 
tory. Coatney (1933) also found this to be 
true in the case of the mourning dove. 
Various workers have indicated that early 
stages in the sporogony of Haemoproteus col- 
umbae are capable of a certain amount of de- 
velopment in bloodsucking insects other than 
the hippoboscid vector. Wenyon (1926: 897) 
has summarized the reports of Aragao and 
Noller, who indicated that ookinetes were 
formed in mites, bedbugs, and various species 
of culicine mosquitoes. In Aedes argenteus 
(= Aedes aegypti) Noller found that ookinetes 
