Comparative effects of single and mixture of indigenous medicinal plants on gastro-intestinal nematodes and growth of calves

An experiment was designed to study the efficacy of three indigenous medicinal plants in single as well as mixture of them on gastro-intestinal nematode infection and growth of calves under rural situation. Twenty-five growing calves were divided into five groups (A, B, C, D & E) and randomly assigned to five anthelmintic treatments- Neem leaves, Atis leaves, Pineapple leaves, mixture of the three leaves and patent drug Albendazole, respectively. Faecal samples were examined immediately before treatment and on 7th, 14th, 21st and 28th day post-treatment. Live weight was measured prior to treatment and thereafter fortnightly until 60th day post-treatment. There were no significant differences in the efficacy (FECR %) values of the herbal anthelmintics on 7th day post-treatment, however, FECR% on 14th and 21st day post-treatment of Pineapple leaves (71.67&75.33) were significantly (P<0.01) higher than that of the others. In these periods of study, Neem leaves gave the second highest value (57.36&58.79) that was slightly higher than those of the mixture of leaves. On 28th day, Pineapple leaves as well as the leaf mixture gave significantly (P<0.05) higher values (60.45&59.08%, respectively) than those of the other leaves. All the efficacy values of individual leaves decreased after 21st day post-treatment while that of the mixture of leaves continued to increase up to 28th day. Although there were no significant differences in the mean values for the parameters, the highest live weight gain was observed in the Albendazole group and the lowest value was in the Atis group.