Sustainable Control of Parasitic Gastroenteritis in Small Ruminants

Small ruminants especially sheep and goat are an integral part of poor and marginal farmer’s livelihood sustenance. Most of the grazing ruminants are infected with gastro intestinal nematodes that leads to parasitic gastroenteritis especially tropical and subtropical. They cause clinical and subclinical infection with symptoms ranging from reduction in weight, diarrhoea, anemia, and bottle jaw. The prolific nematodes involved in gastrointestinal parasitism includes Haemonchus contortus, Trichostrongylus sp, Oesophagostomum sp, Bunostomum sp and Nematodirus sp. The pathogenic potential of H contortus is due to blood-feeding behavior and heavy infections causes anemia. The life cycle is simple and direct, adult females in the abomasum or intestines produce eggs that are passed along the faeces. Inside the egg, first-stage larva develops and hatches out. After hatching, larvae feed on bacteria, moult to the second stage larva, with another moult form third larval stage which are the infective stage that moves out of faeces to herbages, where they are ingested by animals while grazing. Inside the host body two further moults lead to development of adult roundworms (Zajac, 2006). The control of these roundworms must involve breaking the life cycle of the worm; either by anthelmintics or pasture/ animal management. Small ruminants especially sheep and goat are an integral part of poor and marginal farmer’s livelihood sustenance. Most of the grazing ruminants are infected with gastro intestinal nematodes that leads to parasitic gastroenteritis especially tropical and subtropical. They cause clinical and subclinical infection with symptoms ranging from reduction in weight, diarrhoea, anemia, and bottle jaw. The prolific nematodes involved in gastrointestinal parasitism includes Haemonchus contortus, Trichostrongylus sp, Oesophagostomum sp, Bunostomum sp and Nematodirus sp. The pathogenic potential of H contortus is due to blood-feeding behavior and heavy infections causes anemia. The life cycle is simple and direct, adult females in the abomasum or intestines produce eggs that are passed along the faeces. Inside the egg, first-stage larva develops and hatches out. After hatching, larvae feed on bacteria, moult to the second stage larva, with another moult form third larval stage which are the infective stage that moves out of faeces to herbages, where they are ingested by animals while grazing. Inside the host body two further moults lead to development of adult roundworms (Zajac, 2006). The control of these roundworms must involve breaking the life cycle of the worm; either by anthelmintics or pasture/ animal management.