Our monthly parasite reports help you benchmark your own smallholding and watch for seasonal disease spikes & drug resistance:
Month: February 2021
Parasite Levels:
Roundworms: moderate, average 244 epgs in ruminants, 344 in equines
Barber Pole Haemonchus: zero (prefers warmer weather)
Liver Flukes: zero (good news - this is usually peak month for egg detection)
Coccidia: zero (good news - often flares up in winter)
Life cycle of Liver Flukes. Shows how the ruminants get infected in early autumn, then the flukes multiply in the liver and release their eggs in late winter. The absence of any infections now shows the drier summer of 2020 inhibited the mudsnail population, and that Smallholders are brilliant at managing water on their grazing 😁
Resistance:
Ivermectin: zero
Moxidectin: zero
Albendazole: zero
Eprinomectin: zero
Levamisole: zero
We needed to double dose a few sheep with ivermectin (2 doses 5 weeks apart) to clear some Trichostrongyle roundworm infections. This isn't a reflection of resistance, just the short activity of ivermectin compared to the more persistent drugs such as moxidectin.
Average Results by Species:
Goats: Roundworms 188 epg, all others zero
Sheep: Roundworms 268 epg, all others zero
Cattle: Roundworms 256 epg, all others zero
Pigs: all zero
Poultry: all zero
Alpacas: Roundworms 36 epg, one case of Marshallagia - a deer worm that is asymptomatic in Alpacas
Dogs: all zero
Horses: strongyle Roundworms 56 epg
Donkeys: all zero
Other Findings:
Mites: lots of goats had mites in their faeces, these will have been accidentally consumed during grooming.
Micro Plastics: 4% of samples had microplastics, these are contaminants in pelleted feeds.
