Gastro-Intestinal Parasites In Exotic Avian Fauna Of Central Zoo, Jawalakhel, Lalitpur, Nepal

Abstract

The present study was conducted to determine the general prevalence, helminthes and protozoan wise prevalence of gastrointestinal parasites and assess the management practices of 16 species of exotic avian fauna present at Central Zoo, Jawalakhel, Lalitpur, Nepal. Altogether 100 faecal samples were collected on third week of April, 2017. The qualitative examination of faecal samples were done by iodine wet mount for protozoan and flotation and sedimentation technique for helminthes whereas Microsoft Excel 2013 and “R” version 3.3.1 software package was used for data analysis. Out of total 100 faecal samples examined, 54 fecal samples were positive with overall prevalence of 54%. Total of five species of gastrointestinal parasites were identified that include one genera of protozoa: Eimeria sp. (37%) and four genera of helminthes: Ascaridia sp. (23 %) showed the highest prevalence followed by Trichostrongylus sp. (10 %), Strongyloides sp. (7 %) and Codiostomum sp. (3 %). Although the prevalence rate of protozoan parasites (37 %) was higher than prevalence rate of helminthes parasites (33 %) but statistically the difference in prevalence of helminth and protozoan parasites was found to be insignificant (p = 0.656, χ2 = 0.197). Single infection wasfound to be higher than mixed infection. Statistically, the difference in prevalence of single and mixed infection was found to be significant (p = 0.034, χ2 = 4.481). Among mixed infections, double infection showed the highest infection rate (76.19 %) than multiple infection (23.80 %). Although the study indicates that exotic avain fauna at Central Zoo were infected to gastrointestinal parasites but the maintenance of hygiene and deworming programme is found to be effective because the birds kept inside the cage are active and death rate is very low but the possibility of reappearance of parasitic infection is always there due to stress and also due to closer proximity with other foraging birds that directly transmit parasites.