In Vivo Anthelmintic Activity of Whole Plant Powder of Striga Hermonthica (Deli.) Benth

The fight against Gastro-Intestinal Nematodes is an urgent necessity for the sheep’s productivity improvement in Burkina Faso. The anthelmintic activity of S. hermonthica’s whole plant powder was evaluated on Mossi sheep artificially infested with H. contortus L3 larvae. The experiment lasted 21 days with 2 phases of 4 days of treatment separated by 6 days in station. Two (2) treated lots of 6 sheep each received respectively 17g/kg of body weight and 10g/kg of body weight while two (2) control lots of 6 sheep each, one negative without treatment and one positive treated with levamisole 1/2 bolus for 25 kg were constituted. The faecal egg count (FEC) reduction rate was high during treatment and reached 84.49% for the 17g/kg body weight dose and 83.69% for the 10g/kg body weight dose at D21. Statistical analysis shows no significant difference between the two doses tested and between the two doses and the positive control, whereas the difference is significant (P<0.05) with the negative control. The mean hematocrit level ranged from 24 at D0 to 30.5 at D21 for the 17g/kg body weight treatment and from 25.83 at D0 to 31 at D21 for the 10g/kg body weight dose. The average daily gain (ADG) of the treated lots was not significant compared to the negative control (P>0.05).