Department of Veterinary Parasitology, College of Veterinary and Animal Science, Bikaner, Rajasthan University of Veterinary and Animal Sciences, Rajasthan, India
*Corresponding author: V Bharti; E-mail: vishavbhartithakur3154@gmail.com
Online Published on 13 July, 2023.
Haemoprotozoan diseases have deleterious impact on health and production of animals causing death in acute cases, production losses in chronically affected animals which decrease economic share of livestock sector. Thus with aim to record prevalence rate of haemoprotozoan infection in diary animals from Bikaner region of Rajasthan (India) present study was conducted from January to September 2021 on 200 (117 cattle and 83 Buffalo) dairy animals. Conventional microscopy method of Giemsa’s stained blood smears was used for screening blood samples for haemoprotozoans. Out of total screened 24(20.5%) cattle and 13(15.7%) buffalo were found positive for haemoprotozoans with highly prevalent Theileria spp. 12.5% (25) followed by Anaplasma spp. 3.0% (6), Babesia spp. and mixed infection 1.5% (3) each. Age wise highest prevalence showed by below 6 months aged (22.3%) followed by > 2 years (20.9%) and 6 months to 2 years (19.7%) in cattle and below 6 months (23.1%) followed by 6 months to 2 years (16.7%) and > 2 years (10.7%) in buffalo. Breed wise crossbred cattle showed highest infection rate of 23.5% with female more infected in both species 24.1% (20/83) in cattle and 18.7% (11/59) buffalo and highest prevalence rate in monsoon season in both cattle(28.4%) and buffalo(24%).
• Crossbred cattle and female animals are at higher risk of getting disease with more infection in monsoon season.
• Earlier diagnosis of carrier animals is important to prevent losses
Bikaner, Haemoprotozoan, Prevalence, Dairy animals
