Limited dispersal in an ectoparasitic mite, Laelaps giganteus, contributes to significant phylogeographic congruence with their rodent hosts, Rhabdomys

To explore how biogeography, parasite life history and host vagility influences evolutionary codivergences, we followed a comparative phylogeography approach using a host specific non-permanent mite, Laelaps giganteus that occurs on four rodent species within the genus Rhabdomys. A mtDNA COI haplotype network derived for 278 parasite specimens showed marked phylogeographic congruence with host distributions. Analysis of the less variable nuclear intron Tropomyosin was in part consistent with these results. Although distance-based cophylogenetic analyses in AXPARAFIT failed to support significant mtDNA codivergences (P ≥ 0.02), event-based analyses revealed significant cophylogeny between sampling localities of Rhabdomys and Laelaps using CORE-PA (P = 0.046) and JANE (P = 0.026; P = 0.00). These findings, in conjunction with the weak congruence previously reported among the permanent ectoparasitic lice Polyplax and Rhabdomys, suggest that host-parasite intimacy is not the most important ...