hematophagy

Dog fleas are external parasites, living by hematophagy off the blood of dogs.

Psychiatric cases of patients performing hematophagy also exist.

Vampire bats are bats whose food source is blood, a dietary trait called hematophagy.

Head lice feed on human blood (hematophagy), and itching from lice bites is a common symptom of this condition.

Ticks are ectoparasites (external parasites), living by hematophagy on the blood of mammals, birds, and sometimes reptiles and amphibians.

Some religious rituals and symbols seemingly mirror hematophagy, such as in the transubstantiation of wine as the blood of Jesus Christ during Christian eucharist.

This is fundamental for the leeches' alimentary habit of hematophagy, since it keeps the blood flowing after the initial phlebotomy performed by the worm on the host's skin.

The females feed on mammal blood (hematophagy) (hence the Latin name Haematopota pluvialis, literally meaning 'blooddrinker of the rains'), needing blood for developing eggs.

Organisms that feed on exudate are known as exudativores; for example, the Vampire Bat exhibits hematophagy, and the Pygmy marmoset is an obligate gummivore (primarily eats tree gum).

Some fish, such as lampreys and Candirus and mammals, especially the vampire bats, and birds, such as the vampire finches, Hood Mockingbirds, and oxpeckers, also practice hematophagy.

Gene expansion in Anopheles has been observed for genes involved in hematophagy and insecticide resistance; it is unclear to what extent these two factors are involved here, although ion channels are clearly targets of insecticides.

Since blood is a fluid tissue rich in nutritious proteins and lipids that can be taken without enormous effort, hematophagy has evolved as a preferred form of feeding in many small animals such as worms and arthropods.

Some societies, such as the Moche, had ritual hematophagy, as well as the Scythians, a nomadic people of Russia, who had the habit of drinking the blood of the first enemy they would kill in battle.