Theileria parva genetic diversity and haemoparasite prevalence in cattle and wildlife in and around Lake Mburo National Park in Uganda

Abstract

Wildlife, especially Cape buffalo (Syncerus caffer), are thought to act as a reservoir for many of the important tick-borne pathogens of cattle. In this study, we have determined the prevalence of the most significant tick-borne haemoparasites in wildlife (buffalo, impala, eland and bushbuck) as well as in cattle grazing inside and neighbouring Lake Mburo National Park (LMNP) in Uganda. A high percentage of buffalo were carriers of Theileria parva, Theileria mutans, Theileria velifera, Theileria buffeli and Theileria sp. (buffalo) as well as Anaplasma marginale and Anaplasma centrale. The majority of impala sampled were carriers of A. centrale, and all were carriers of an unidentified Babesia/Theileria species. The eland and bushbuck sampled were all carriers of Theileria taurotragi and Theileria buffeli, and the majority were carriers of T. mutans. The bushbuck sampled were also carriers for Erhlichia bovis. There were some differences in the prevalence of haemoparasites between the calves sampled inside and neighbouring LMNP. In order to address the question of whether there is evidence for interbreeding between buffalo-associated and cattle-associated T. parva populations, multi-locus genotypes (MLGs) of T. parva (based on micro-satellite markers) from buffalo and from calves grazing inside and outside LMNP were compared, and the results revealed that buffalo and cattle gene pools were distinct, showing no evidence for transmission of buffalo-derived T. parva genotypes to the cattle population.

Haemoparasite prevalence and Theileria parva strain diversity in Cape buffalo (Syncerus caffer) in Uganda

“…Thus the published data suggest that infections with these parasite species are rare but whether this is due to inherent resistance is not clear. Previous data (Oura et al, 2010) from cattle grazing in or near LMNP which are also not infected with E. ruminantium, B. bovis or B. bigemina, despite being susceptible to these pathogens, supports the view that these pathogens are not present rather than their absence from buffalo reflecting inherent resistance.…”

“…taurotragi, which is considered to be primarily a parasite of eland (Grootenhuis et al, 1980), was not present in any of the sampled buffalo, suggesting that buffalo are resistant to this parasite. Eland are present in all the sampled parks except QENP and, in a recent study of animals from LMNP (Oura et al, 2010), 100% of the eland were infected with T. taurotragi. Additionally, a previous study showed that T. taurotragi was present in a significant percentage of cattle in Uganda (Oura et al, 2004b) leading to the conclusion that the parasite was likely to be circulating directly amongst cattle populations in that country.…”

Investigating the diversity of the 18S SSU rRNA hyper-variable region of Theileria in cattle and Cape buffalo (Syncerus caffer) from southern Africa using a next generation sequencing approach

“…Of interest, is that RLB screening of Nyala, Eland and Kudu also did not detect T. velifera in areas endemic for A. hebraeum and A. variegatum (Oura et al 2011;Pfitzer et al 2011;Berggoetz et al 2014). This suggest that the preferential host of T. velifera A may be antelope and an antelope tick vector.…”

“…More sequences were found for T. mutans-like 1/2/3 compared to T. mutans and T. mutans MSD, suggesting that these latter genotypes generally occur at lower parasitemia in buffalo than buffalo specific genotypes. This is of interest since, RLB based studies indicated a high prevalence of T. mutans in buffalo (Oura et al 2011;Chaisi et al 2011;Pienaar et al 2014), but this has probably been confounded by the non-specificity of the T. mutans probe that also detect T.…”

Molecular Detection of Tick-Borne Pathogen Diversities in Ticks from Livestock and Reptiles along the Shores and Adjacent Islands of Lake Victoria and Lake Baringo, Kenya

“…In Uganda, severe anaplasmosis, ECF, and babesiosis were reported a decade ago as causes of livestock morbidity and mortality around the Lake Victoria basin (29). More recently, high prevalences of diverse Theileria, Anaplasma , and Ehrlichia species have been identified among wildlife hosts in Lake Mburo National Park, Uganda (30) and Laikipia County, Kenya (31), and among ticks sampled in the Shimba Hills National Reserve, Kenya (32). …”