Prevalence and biodiversity of helminth parasites in donkeys(Equus asinus) in Iran

There are over two million equine animals in iran, of which approximately 75% aredonkeys. despite this, very little is known about their parasite status and the impact of this ontheir work output. usually, it is the alimentary canal, body cavity and liver that harbor parasitesin equine species. in this study, 45 donkeys were examined at necropsy. thecontents of the stomach, small intestines and large intestine were washed separately andexamined for helminth parasites. their livers were sliced into 1×3cm pieces, squeezed in warmwater and examined for helminths. the skin, eyes and all other internal organs underwent asearch for parasites. twenty-two species of nematodes were identified, which included onespecies of cestode, two species of trematodes and one species of gastrophiliid. the speciesincluded ascaridae(×1), atracidae(×1), oxyuridae(×1), trichostrongylidae(×1), spiruridae(×1),anoplocephalidae(×1), fasciolidae(×1) dicrocoeliidae(×1), gastrophiliidae(×1),strongylinae(×3), habronematidae(×3), and cyathostominae(×12). the most abundant groupwith regards to the number of species and their intensity of infection was cyathostominae(small strongyles), in which and were themost prevalent and abundant species. was the commonest species amongthe large strongyles.of the three species of was the most prevalentspecies, followed by . and . . was collected from20% of donkeys, and more than 450,000 worms were collected from a single animal.was collected from 66.6% of the donkeys that were examined in thisstudy. the prevalence and intensity of the other helminths were low. the presence of mixedinfections was the rule in this study, as this was found in all 45 donkeys. the consequent effectof such infections on the health of donkeys needs further investigation.