Seasonal Prevalence of Helminthic Infections in the Gastrointestinal Tract of Sheep in Mazandaran Province, Northern Iran

Abstract

Helminthic infection is the major cause of the sheep’s reduced productivity. In this study, a total number of 240 fecal samples of sheep from stationary flocks of four different zones of Mazandaran province (Amol, Babol, Sari, and Nowshahr cities) were examined each season, out of which 53.33% of animals were affected by the helminthic infections. The most prevalent infecting parasites were the Trichostrongylidae (46.61%), followed by the Fasciola (9.96%). In addition, the Strongyloides had the lowest proportion with only 2.39%. The other detected parasites included Chabertia (5.98%), Cooperia (3.19%), Nematodirus (3.19%), Trichuris (5.58%), Toxocaridae (4.78%), Haemonchus (4.78%), Ostertagia (5.58%), Oesophagostomum (4.78%), and Dicrocoelium (3.19%). The nematodes had the highest percentage with 86.85%, whereas the trematodes followed them with 13.15%. No significant difference was observed between the infection level in females and males, with 56.9% and 43.94% rates of infection, respectively. Significantly lower infection was observed in winter compared with the other seasons. Trichostrongylidae was the dominant genus across all seasons. It was also noted that winter had the lowest percentage of helminthic infection significantly. The eggs per gram of feces was also estimated, and it showed that a significant number of sheep are infected with a moderate number of parasites. In a conclusion, even though livestock farmers have been using antiparasitic drugs in their livestock in recent years, parasitic infection still exists in livestock. Thus, a proper implementation of helminthic infection control programs in this area should be employed as the key element for reducing the high prevalence of livestock helminthic infection.

Potential of Natural Antioxidants for Upregulating Apoptosis in Cervical Cancer Cells: A Cellular and Molecular Study

“…Te MTT results were analyzed by employing Graphpad Prism software version 9. P < 0.05 was considered signifcant [33][34][35]. Te one-way ANOVA and the post hoc Tuckey test were employed to compare the diferences between diferent cell groups [36,37].…”

Comparison of Rabies Cases Received by the Shomal Pasteur Institute in Northern Iran: A 2-Year Study

“…IBM SPSS Statistics for Windows, Version 26.0. Armonk, NY: IBM Corp), and the chi-square test [ 19 ] was employed to compare the number of suspected and positive samples. p < 0.05 was considered a significant difference [ 20 ].…”

Monitoring of the epizootic situation regarding trichurosis of sheep in the Poltava region

“…According to scientists, such a difference in the rates of infestation of sheep by the causative agent of trichurosis in different regions depends on the climatic conditions of the territory, the observance of zoohygienic rules for feeding and keeping animals, as well as the implementation of veterinary and sanitary measures (Dafur et al, 2020;Salehi et al, 2022). Therefore, it is relevant to determine the epizootological features of trichurosis among sheep in different climatic and geographical regions of Ukraine.…”