Infection With The Pinworm Blatticola Blattae And Survival of Starving German Cockroaches, Blattella Germanica

Abstract The German cockroach, Blattella germanica, is often infected with the pinworm, Blatticola blattae. To investigate the effect of pinworm infection on cockroach survival, we artificially manipulated the pinworm infection status of two lines of German cockroaches kept in the laboratory and compared survival rates in starvation. Of the two lines of German cockroaches WATn and NIIDp bred in the laboratory, the WATn line was not infected with pinworm, and the NIIDp line was naturally infected with pinworm B. blattae. The WATp line was created by artificially infecting the pinworm B. blattae with this WATn line. The NIIDn line was created by treating the NIIDp line with anthelmintic drugs. The 50% survival days of uninfected WATn line of starving cockroaches was 8 days, and infected WATp line of starving cockroaches was 13 days. The 50% survival days of naturally infected NIIDp line of starving cockroaches was 6 days, and that of anthelmintic-treated NIIDn line of cockroaches was 4 days. The survival days were significantly longer in pinworm-infected cockroaches than uninfected or anthelmintic-treated cockroaches. These results suggest that pinworm infection enhances the survival of cockroaches under starving conditions.