Data from: Mammal decline, linked to invasive Burmese python, shifts host use of vector mosquito towards reservoir hosts of a zoonotic disease

Invasive apex predators have profound impacts on natural communities, yet
the consequences of these impacts on the transmission of zoonotic
pathogens are unexplored. Collapse of large- and medium-sized mammal
populations in the Florida Everglades has been linked to the invasive
Burmese python, Python bivittatus Kuhl. We used historic and current data
to investigate potential impacts of these community effects on contact
between the reservoir hosts (certain rodents) and vectors of Everglades
virus, a zoonotic mosquito-borne pathogen that circulates in southern
Florida. The percentage of blood meals taken from the primary reservoir
host, the hispid cotton rat, Sigmodon hispidus Say and Ord, increased
dramatically (422.2%) from 1979 (14.7%) to 2016 (76.8%), while blood meals
from deer, raccoons and opossums decreased by 98.2%, reflecting
precipitous declines in relative abundance of these larger mammals,
attributed to python predation. Overall species diversity of hosts
detected in Culex cedecei blood meals from the Everglades declined by
40.2% over the same period (H(1979) = 1.68, H(2016) = 1.01). Predictions
based upon the dilution effect theory suggest that increased relative
feedings upon reservoir hosts translate into increased abundance of
infectious vectors, and a corresponding upsurge of Everglades virus
occurrence and risk of human exposure, although this was not tested in the
current study. This work constitutes the first indication that an invasive
predator can increase contact between vectors and reservoirs of a human
pathogen and highlights unrecognized indirect impacts of invasive
predators.