Code and data: Evidence for the vacated niche hypothesis in parasites of invasive mammals

Species redistribution and invasion are becoming increasingly common due to climate change and anthropogenic impacts. Understanding the resultant shifts in host-parasite associations is important for anticipating disruptions to host communities, disease cycles, and conservation efforts. In this paper, we bring together the enemy release and vacated niche hypotheses to relate parasite acquisition and retention, two distinct yet intertwined processes that play out during host invasion. Using the Global Mammal Parasite Database, we test for net enemy release based on differences in parasite species richness, and we develop a novel taxonomic null modeling approach to demonstrate that parasites fill vacated niches. We find evidence of net enemy release, and our taxonomic null models indicate replacement of lost parasites by taxonomically similar acquired ones, over and above what might be expected by chance. Our work suggests that both enemy release and vacated niche hypotheses provide valua..., , , # Code and data: Evidence for the vacated niche hypothesis in parasites of invasive mammals

#### Annakate M. Schatz and Andrew W. Park

[https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.37pvmcvsp](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.37pvmcvsp)

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All data preparation, analysis, and modeling were done in R v3.5.1-4.2.1.

NOTE: Before running code, please move the data from Dryad into a \"data\" subfolder in the same parent folder as the code from Zenodo (\"Schatz_Park_code\"), as this is the structure via which the code files will try to load data.

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CODE

0.data-prep.R: filter and clean host-parasite data on acquistion and retention for analyses

* Data loaded: cluster-data-previous-work.Rda
* Data created: data-prep.Rda

0a.ecoregion-bioclim.R: extract bioclimatic data for all relevant ecoregions associated with focal hosts

* Data loaded: range-data-previous-work.Rda, wc2.1_10m_bio (folder)
* NOTE: The WorldClim data in the folder \"wc2.1_10m_bio\" cannot be uploaded to Dryad due to differences in license...