Spurious Parasites in the Feces 
of Animals 
SPURIOUS parasite may be defined as anything which is not a 
XA. true parasite, at least in the host in which it is found, but which 
has been regarded as a parasite in that host or which may be mistaken 
for a parasite of that host. 
Some of these spurious parasites are true parasites of hosts other 
than the one in which they are found; thus Oxyuris compar, reported 
by Leidy from the small intestine of the cat, is probably O. ambigua 
Fig. 66. Dark fibre cells of banana, showing arrangement resembling tapeworm 
strobila. Enlarged. From Stiles and Hassall, 1902. 
from the large intestine of the rabbit, the cat having eaten the rabbit 
intestine a short time before the death of the cat and of the finding of 
the worm in the small intestine postmortem. 
A second group of spurious parasites is composed of non-parasitic 
animals which have been eaten and subsequently found in the digestive 
tract or feces of the animal which ate them; thus various insect larvae 
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