Parasitological characteristics and tissue response in the abomasum of sheep infected with Haemonchus spp.

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A histopathological study was conducted on the abomasal mucosa of 40 Corriedale sheep exposed to natural infection with Haemonchus spp. The sheep were allowed to graze on contaminated pastures for 14 days and, after being housed for 28 days, they were slaughtered. Fecal samples were collected for fecal egg counts (FEC) and abomasum samples were obtained for histopathological examination and eosinophil, mast cell and globule leucocyte counts. The number of Haemonchus spp. present in the abomasum was estimated from a 10% aliquot of its content. The number of eggs per female was estimated for 10 Haemonchus spp. females collected from each animal. The following significant correlation coefficients were obtained between the characteristics analyzed: number of Haemonchus and FEC (r = 0.86), female length and number of eggs per female (r = 0.60), female length and FEC (r = 0.53), number of eosinophils and number of Haemonchus (r = 0.48), number of eosinophils and number of globule leucocytes (r = 0.54), number of mast cells and female length (r = -0.39), and number of mast cells and number of globule leucocyte (r = 0.34). The characteristics that showed the highest correlation with animal load was FEC.