Parasite



Parasitism is a non-mutual symbiotic relationship between species, where one species, the parasite, benefits at the expense of the other, the host.

Unlike predators, parasites do not kill their host, are generally much smaller than their host, and will often live in or on their host for an extended period. Both are special cases of consumer-resource interactions. Parasitism differs from the parasitoid relationship because parasitoids generally kill their hosts.