anopluran

plural anoplurans

1. Any louse of the suborder Anoplura, a sucking louse.

   Unlike the masticating mallophagans, anoplurans have mouthparts modified for piercing epidermal tissues and sucking up blood.

   1993, May Berenbaum, Ninety-nine More Maggots, Mites, and Munchers, page 226

   2 more examples

   Ungulates and squirrels (the latter in the family Sciuridae) are particularly heavily parasitized by anoplurans, and several small or even monotypic families of anoplurans parasitize phylogenetically isolated mammalian groups.

   2005, David Grimaldi, Evolution of the Insects, unnumbered page

   The next simplest case involves one anopluran and one mallophagan species per host species (e.g., Haematopinus asini plus Domalinia equi on Equus caballus and Linognathus setosus plus Trichodectes canis on Canis familiaris). Cattle (Bos taurus) present a more complex case; they are infested by three anoplurans and one mallophagan, and attention to generic morphologic characteristics is required for their differentiation.

   2009, Dwight D. Bowman, Jay R. Georgi, Georgis' Parasitology for Veterinarians, page 34

   Synonyms: sucking louse