Data for: A mosquito parasite is locally adapted to its host but not temperature

Climate change will alter interactions between parasites and their hosts.
Warming may affect patterns of local adaptation, shifting the environment
to favor the parasite or host and thus changing the prevalence of disease.
We assessed local adaptation to hosts and temperature in the facultative
ciliate parasite Lambornella clarki, which infects the western tree hole
mosquito Aedes sierrensis. We conducted laboratory infection experiments
with mosquito larvae and parasites collected from across a climate
gradient, pairing sympatric or allopatric populations across three
temperatures that were either matched or mismatched to the source
environment. L. clarki parasites were locally adapted to their hosts, with
2.6x higher infection rates on sympatric compared to allopatric
populations, but were not locally adapted to temperature. Infection peaked
at the intermediate temperature of 12.5°C, notably lower than the optimum
temperature for free-living L. clarki growth, suggesting that the host’s
immune response can play a significant role in mediating the outcome of
infection. Our results highlight the importance of host selective pressure
on parasites, despite the impact of temperature on infection success.