Resumen

GARCIAS, FÉLIX; MENDOZA, RICARDO  y  GEORGE-NASCIMENTO, MARIO. Between-years variation in infracommunities of metazoan parasites of the croaker Cilus gilberti (Pisces: Sciaenidae) from Chile. Rev. chil. hist. nat. [online]. 2001, vol.74, n.4, pp. 833-840. ISSN 0716-078X.  doi: 10.4067/S0716-078X2001000400010.

The composition, richness, diversity, abundance and dominance in infracommunities of metazoan parasites found in 86 croaker Cilus gilberti (Abbott 1889) are compared between two samples taken off Talcahuano, Chile, with 15 years of difference. All hosts harboured parasites, and 26 taxa were collected. The prevalence of all taxa, and the abundance of 22 taxa were recorded. Most (69 %) taxa were found in both years. However, to compare between years, we just considered those 13 taxa occurring in at least 10 host individuals. Significant variations in composition but not in richness, abundance, diversity and dominance were found when infracommunities collected from croaker of similar body length were compared between years. Despite the fact that there are few antecedents on the subject, these results are similar to those reported in infracommunities of metazoan parasites of fishes and mammals in that there is high compositional variability and low aggregate variability. The extent to which this can be interpreted as indicating community compensation or stasis is discussed, considering that biological interactions could also be responsible for the observed pattern

Palabras clave : infracommunities; composition; diversity; between-year comparisons; Cilus gilberti; Chile.