Ecology, Conservation and Management of Wild Pigs and Peccaries

Part II: Species Accounts

96

Parasites and Diseases

Phacochoerus africanus is host to a large number of ectopara-

sites [fleas, lice, mites, ticks (about 65 species), fly larvae] and

endoparasites (protozoans, cestodes, trematodes, nematodes;

Geigy 1955; Cumming 1975; Horak et al. 1988; Boomker et al.

1991; Booyse & Dehority 2012; Matthee et al. 2013). See table 6

at http://www.wildsolutions.nl/phacochoerus/.

There is interspecific grooming of P. a f r i c a n u s by at least five

species: yellow-billed oxpecker Buphagus africanus (Grobler

& Charsley 1978), red-billed oxpecker Buphagus erythrorhyn-

chus (Grobler 1980), southern ground-hornbill Bucorvus

leadbeateri (Coetzee 2010), African helmeted turtle Pelomedusa

galeata (Rosenmeier 2013; Owen 2015), and the banded

mongoose Mungo mungo (Sazima 2010; Plumptre 2016).

Mud wallowing (Figure 9.8) has a thermoregulatory func-

tion for P. a f r i c a n u s. Mud wallowing probably also reduces

ectoparasite burdens; after the mud dries, the skin is rubbed on

a tree or other object to remove ectoparasites stuck in the mud

(Cumming 1975; Skinner & Chimimba 2005).

Phacochoerus africanus is probably the original vertebrate

host of African swine fever (= warthog fever) Asfivirus sp., an

important disease of domestic pigs Sus scrofa. The soft tick

Ornithodorous moubata is the vector. Rates of infection are very

high in some regions. Infected P. a f r i c a n u s show no clinical signs

of this disease, yet may be the most important reservoir (Jori &

Bastos 2009; Penrith 2009).

Phacochoerus africanus is the preferred blood meal host

of savanna tsetse fly Glossina morsitans morsitans, the vec-

tor for Trypanosoma brucei, the cause of trypanosomiasis

Figure 9.8 Two young adult female

common warthogs Phacochoerus

africanus wallowing in mud at Tsavo East

National Park, south-east Kenya. Mud

wallowing helps with thermoregulation

and probably also helps to remove

ectoparasites. Photograph by Yvonne

de Jong and Tom Butynski.

Figure 9.7 Young adult female

common warthog Phacochoerus

africanus with secretion flowing from

the preorbital dermal gland at Tsavo

East National Park, south-east Kenya.

Photograph by Yvonne de Jong and

Tom Butynski.

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