Fig. 2
Blood stages (a–d) and bone marrow phanerozoites (e–h) of Plasmodium (Huffia) elongatum (cytochrome b lineage pGRW6) from experimentally infected Common crossbills Loxia curvirostra: a—trophozoite; b—erythrocytic meront; c—macrogametocyte; d—microgametocyte; e–h—secondary exoerythrocytic meronts (phanerozoites). Arrowheads (
)—pigment granules, long arrows with wide arrowheads (
)—meronts, short arrows (
)—merozoite, long arrows (
)—nuclei of the parasite, long arrow with triangle wide arrowhead (
)—nucleus of phanerozoite host cell. Note presence of meronts in immature erythrocytes (b), relatively small size of mature erythrocytic meronts (b), spindle-like shape of merozoites located in a parallel row in maturing erythrocytic meront (b), and attenuated elongate form of gametocytes (c, d). These are the main morphological characters of P. elongatum. Maturing phanerozoites are small (f–h), with bright blue cytoplasm, which texture has so much similarity to that of host cell that it is difficult to see line of separation between them. Pigment granules are absent from phanerozoites. Giemsa stained blood films. Scale bar = 10 µm