Vouraki Sotiria, Gelasakis Athanasios I, Papanikolopoulou Vasiliki, Papadopoulos Elias, Arsenos Georgios
Laboratory of Animal Husbandry, School of Veterinary Medicine, Faculty of Health Sciences, Aristotle University, 54124 Thessaloniki, Greece.
Department of Animal Science, School of Animal Biosciences, Agricultural University of Athens, 11855 Athens, Greece.
Animals (Basel). 2022 Feb 1;12(3):354. doi: 10.3390/ani12030354.
Extensively reared ruminants are seasonally exposed to ticks. Tick-related production losses and health issues have been well documented in cows and sheep but not in goats where relevant literature is scarce. The objective here was to investigate the association of hard tick infestation with milk production and udder health of dairy goats reared extensively. A cross-sectional study was carried out during May and June, in two dairy goat farms. The farms were located in Central and Northern Greece and were representative of typical extensive production systems. A total of 304 goats ( = 152 from each farm) were randomly selected. Each goat was examined for presence of hard ticks. Daily milk yield and quality characteristics were recorded. Udder health status was determined by milk somatic cell count (SCC) and total viable count (TVC). Tick infestation prevalence was 28.6%; it was associated with a significant ( < 0.001) increase in SCC and TVC (84.0% and 78.6%, respectively). The latter meant that infested goats were 3.7 times more prone to udder health problems ( < 0.001). There were not any significant effects ( > 0.05) on milk production. Overall, results suggest that control of tick infestation in extensively reared dairy goat herds is important for enhancing health and welfare status.
广泛饲养的反刍动物会季节性地接触蜱虫。蜱虫相关的生产损失和健康问题在奶牛和绵羊中已有充分记录，但在山羊中相关文献较少。本文的目的是调查广泛饲养的奶山羊硬蜱感染与产奶量和乳房健康之间的关联。在5月和6月期间，对两个奶山羊场进行了一项横断面研究。这些农场位于希腊中部和北部，代表了典型的粗放型生产系统。总共随机选择了304只山羊（每个农场152只）。检查每只山羊是否存在硬蜱。记录每日产奶量和质量特征。通过牛奶体细胞计数（SCC）和总活菌数（TVC）确定乳房健康状况。蜱虫感染率为28.6%；它与SCC和TVC的显著增加（<0.001）相关（分别为84.0%和78.6%）。后者意味着受感染的山羊患乳房健康问题的可能性高出3.7倍（<0.001）。对产奶量没有任何显著影响（>0.05）。总体而言，结果表明，控制广泛饲养的奶山羊群中的蜱虫感染对于提高健康和福利状况很重要。
