Fig 1.
Pond Sites on the Blackjack and Lamar Peninsulas.
The Aransas National Wildlife Refuge is located along the Texas Gulf Coast and encompasses the Blackjack Peninsula and Matagorda Island. Eight pond sites in this study were located on the Blackjack Peninsula. The two pond sites on the Lamar Peninsula were included during 2012–2013. The map image was created by the USDA National Agriculture Imagery Program (NAIP) and downloaded as a GIS file, and the figure was produced using ArcMAP 10 (Esri, Redlands, CA).
Fig 2.
Whooping Crane Scat Collection.
Game camera photo of two adult whooping cranes and one juvenile (far left) at a freshwater pond on Aransas National Wildlife Refuge (A). Scat produced by a whooping crane feeding primarily on blue crab and other invertebrates (B) and wolfberry (C). Cranes fed predominantly on wolfberry when the berries were abundant (Nov—Dec), then switched to feed predominantly on crab and other invertebrates. Scat was collected after the cranes naturally left the pond.
Fig 3.
Coccidia Observed during Fecal Flotation.
Fecal flotation under 500X magnification showing a mixed infection with two species of Eimeria. The smaller, pear-shaped oocysts are consistent with Eimeria gruis (arrow) and the larger, round to oval oocysts are consistent with Eimeria reichenowi (arrowhead).
Table 1.
Phenology of Eimeria shedding in winter based on microscopy in whooping crane feces.
Fig 4.
Phylogenetic Tree using Eimeria ITS-1 and ITS-2 Sequences.
Phylogenetic trees using the neighbor-joining method on ITS-1 (466 bp) or ITS-2 (400 bp) sequences from Eimeria species. Bootstrap values are based on 1000 replicates and shown where greater than 60. Bold species indicate isolates from cranes, and underlined species indicate sequences generated in this study. The GenBank accession number of each isolate is shown in parentheses, and the known vertebrate host is also shown.
Fig 5.
Phylogenetic Tree using Eimeria 18S rRNA Sequences.
Phylogenetic tree using the neighbor-joining method on 18S rRNA sequences (358 bp) from Eimeria species. Bootstrap values are based on 1000 replicates and shown where greater than 60. Bold species indicate isolates from cranes, and underlined species indicate sequences generated in this study. The GenBank accession number of each isolate is shown in parentheses, and the known vertebrate host is also shown.