Prevalence and distribution of Sarcocystis sp among wild swine of southeastern United States.

Digestive techniques revealed Sarcocystis sp infection in 62 of 192 (32%) wild swine collected in Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, and West Virginia. Sarcosporidia were not detected in wild swine of Florida and were rarely found in the lower coastal plains of Georgia, Mississippi, and South Carolina. Swine from mountainous terrain in North Carolina, Tennessee, and West Virginia and bottomland floodplain regions of Alabama, Arkansas, and Louisiana were most frequently infected. Infections by sarcocystis sp may have been spread via swine relocated from mountainous regions to some other locales. Upon ingestion of infected pork from wild swine of Tennessee and West Virginia, dogs, but not cats, shed sporocysts morphometrically identical to Sarcocystis suicanis.