A vastagbélférgességet okozó kis- és nagy strongylidák előfordulása hazai ménesekben

Abstract

SUMMARY: Background In Hungary the first studies on the strongyles infections of horses were car ried out at the beginning of the 20th century when both large and small stron gyle species were present. Since that time no detailed data have been reported about the occurrence of Strongylus spp. and small strongyles in the stud farms where the animals are treated with modern anthelmintic at frequent intervals. Objectives The aim was to study the occurrence of small and large strongyles in 5 local stud farms with faecal examination and based on the results to know whether all the horses are needed to be treated against strongyles at frequent intervals. Materials and Methods Fresh faecal samples were collected once from 440 randomly selected horses in 5 stud farms (31–151 samples per farm) between January and April 2015. The horses were kept on pastures at daytime and they were treated 1-2 times a year with anthelmintic pastes, last time 3-6 months before sampling. Strongyle type eggs per gram (EPG) were counted with McMaster technique, and 100 third instar larvae were determined in each faecal sample following larval culture. Results and Discussion Overall 246 out of 440 (55.9%; 95%CI: 51.2–60.5) samples contained Strongyle type eggs. The lowest and the highest EPG was 0 and 1950, respectively. The prevalence of the strongyle infection ranged from 24.5% to 87.0% among the horses examined in the 5 stud farms. Less than half of the examined horses were not infected with strongyles or their EPG were not more than 200. Small strongyles occurred in each farm, majority of the horses (313/440, 71.1%, 95%CI: 66.7–75.1) were infected with these nematodes. The prevalence of small strongyle infection by stud ranged from 48.4% to 89.6%. The third instar larvae of Stron gylus species were found in the samples of 108 (24.5%, 95%CI: 20.7–28.7) horses. The most common species was S. equinus, which infected 98 (22.3%) horses, followed by S. vulgaris and S. edentates, which infected 20 and 7 horses, respec tively. All these large strongyle species were present in 3 places. According to these preliminary data not all the horses should be treated with anthelmintic against these nematode infections in these stud farms.