Theileria annulata, a protozoan parasite of cattle and domestic buffaloes, is transmitted by ticks of the genus Hyalomma, and causes a disease named Mediterranean or tropical theileriosis. In this research 50 cattle naturally infected with Theileria annulata were treated with the extract of the plant Peganum harmala. The treatment was continued for 5 days, the dose of the extract being 5 mg/kg ...

Anaplasma phagocytophilum is a Gram-negative, obligate intracellular tick-transmitted bacterium that replicates in neutrophils. It causes tick-borne fever (TBF) in sheep and cattle, but also elicits febrile disease in humans as well as in other domestic animals such as dogs, horses, and cats. Although increasingly recognized in Europe, the first laboratory-confirmed case of TBF in cattle from G...

Microscopy as “field based test” was compared with IS900 blood PCR for the diagnosis and estimationof prevalence of Mycobacterium avium subspecies paratuberculosis (MAP) in domestic livestock withclinical Johne’s disease (JD). Of 252 animals screened, 39.3 and 13.1% were positive by faecal microscopyand blood PCR, respectively. Proportional agreement between “microscopy” and blood PCR was subst...

During last two decades studies on endozoochorous seed dispersal indicated that a large numbers of plant seeds are potentially dispersed and suceefully germinated via animal dung. However, very little is known about the relative importance of endozoochory in germination success of plant species in semi-steppe rangelands. In this paper we examined dung germinating seed content, seed deposition p...

To determine prevalence of antibodies against Schmallenberg virus in adult cows and proportion of infection transmitted to fetuses, we tested serum samples from 519 cow/calf pairs in Belgium in spring 2012. Of cattle within 250 km of location where the virus emerged, ≈91% tested positive for IgG targeting nucleoprotein. Risk for fetal infection was ≈28%.

Infection with Brucella spp. continues to pose a human health risk globally despite strides in eradicating the disease from domestic animals. Brucellosis has been an emerging disease since the discovery of Brucella melitensis by Sir David Bruce in 1887. Although many countries have eradicated B. abortus from cattle, in some areas B. melitensis and B. suis have emerged as causes of this infectio...

A clinicopathological case of ocular cowpox is reported. Cowpox is no longer regarded as being enzootic in cattle. The most likely mode of transmission of cowpox to man appears to be from the domestic cat or wild rodents.

Rinderpest virus causes a highly contagious and often fatal disease in domestic and wild ruminants. The surface glycoproteins, hemagglutinin (H) and fusion (F) proteins of this enveloped virus are known to confer protective immunity in cattle. We have reported the generation of a recombinant baculovirus expressing H protein and studied its protective properties in cattle. In this report, we dem...

In African savannas, large mammals, both wild and domestic, support an abundant and diverse population of tick ectoparasites. Because of the density of ticks and the many pathogens that they vector, cattle in East Africa are often treated with acaricides. While acaricides are known to be effective at reducing tick burdens on cattle, their effects on the overall abundance and community compositi...