Trapping efficacy of 'Duddingtonia flagrans' against 'Haemonchus contortus' at temperatures existing at lambing in Australia

Abstract

The aim of this study was to determine the trapping efficacy of 'Duddingtonia flagrans' against 'Haemonchus contortus' at the temperature ranges experienced around lambing in the major sheep producing regions of Australia. Faeces were collected from Merino wethers, maintained in an animal house and which had received either D. 'flagrans chlamydospores' for a 6-day period (DF) or not (NIL). Faeces were incubated at one of four daily temperature regimens which were composed of hourly steps to provide 6–19 °C, 9–25 °C, 14–34 °C and 14–39 °C to mimic normal diurnal air temperature variation. Enumeration of the number of preinfective and infective larvae that had migrated from or remained in faecal pellets was used to calculate percentage recovery and trapping efficacy of 'D. flagrans'. Recovery of 'H. contortus' larvae of both stages was significantly lower in DF faeces but the magnitude of the effect was considerably greater for infective larvae. Mean recovery of infective larvae from NIL and DF faeces was 10.6 and 0.4%, respectively, indicating a mean trapping efficacy of 96.4%. The lowest trapping efficacy (80.7%) was observed at 6–19 °C but total recovery of infective larvae, from DF faeces, was greatest at the two highest temperature regimens, although still less than 0.9%. The results of this study indicate that typical Australian lambing temperatures should not be a barrier to the use of 'D. flagrans' as an effective biocontrol of 'H. contortus' in Australia.