Protozoan infection in scavenging chickens from Penang Island And Bota, Perak, Malaysia
2019
Farah Haziqah M. T. | Nik Ahmad Irwan Izzauddin N. H.
Chickens are the most abundant birds in the world, providing protein in the form of meat and eggs. Meat from scavenging chickens or ‘ayam kampung’ has a strong flavour and is juicier than that of commercial chickens. Most of the rural villagers still keep the chickens in small flocks, allowing to range freely around the house or the backyard, require little attention and feed mainly on kitchen wastes. Due to their free-range and scavenging habits, protozoan infections are commonly high because they have an increased opportunity to encounter the oocysts and intermediate hosts such as mosquitoes and flies. Out of 240 scavenging chickens examined, two protozoan parasites have been recovered, namely Eimeria sp. (27.1%) and Leucocytozoon sp. (1.3%), the latter of which was the blood parasite. None of the chickens examined showed any symptoms of coccidiosis or blood parasite infection because Eimeria species and Leucocytozoon spp. vary in their pathogenicity. Thus, future studies on the genetic variants is required in order to reveal the level of varieties and taxonomy of these protozoan parasites.
显示更多 [+] 显示较少 [-]