Prevalence of ixodid ticks infesting cattle in Nagpur district of Maharashtra state

Introduction

Cattle are the backbone of the dairy industry contributing 192.49 million population in India (20 th Livestock Census). Despite the vast contribution of livestock to the Indian economy, the production losses are more due to various diseases (Manjunathachar et al. 2014) [16] . Parasites and parasitic diseases affect livestock production by decreasing the growth rate of animals ultimately responsible for reduced rates of reproduction and production yield and also altering the quality of milk and meat (Sharma et al. 2016) [25] . Ectoparasitic infestation in cattle are responsible for the production losses in livestock sector. Amongst the external parasites ticks infest almost 80% of the cattle population in the world (Benavides et al. 2000) [4] . The overall prevalence of tick infestation in cattle in India was reported as 53 percent (Singh et al. 2022) [27] . Tick infestation is responsible for economic losses through its direct effects viz. tick worry, tick toxicity, sucking of blood, irritancies, damage to hides and weight loss and indirect effects viz. [23,27] . Tickborne diseases ranked in fourth position in major infections of livestock (Ghosh et al. 2007) [9] . Economic losses due to tick-transmitted diseases and expenses on control of ticks reduce the cost-effectiveness of animal production. The present study was conducted to generate the baseline data on the prevalence of different tick species infesting cattle and season-wise prevalence of ixodid ticks in cattle in Nagpur district of Maharashtra state.

Summer (March to May), Monsoon (June to September), Post-monsoon (October and November) and Winter (December to February) during January -December 2023. Ticks were collected from the body of cattle with precautions to preserve their mouth parts and appendages for morphological studies. Ticks were also collected from the ground, cracks and crevices of cattle shed in sample collection bottles. In summer season to maintain moisture, additionally, sterilized sand was kept at the bottom of bottles and a few drops of water sprinkled on it. Ticks were transported to the Department of Veterinary Parasitology, Nagpur Veterinary College for further studies.

Identification of ixodid tick species

The species wise identification of ticks was carried out by preparation of permanent mounts by following the protocol as described by Anish et al. (2020) [1] with some modifications by killing the ticks in Boardman's solution for 8-10 hours. The identification of ticks was done based on morphological keys described by Soulsby (1982) [29] and Walker et al., (2013) [32] by observing ticks under a zoom stereoscopic microscope.

Statistical analysis

The data of the prevalence study was assessed by applying Karl Pearson's Chi-square test of independent variables with a 5% level of significance p<0.05 and 1% level of significance p< 0.1.

Results and Discussion

Season wise prevalence of ixodid ticks in Nagpur district of Maharashtra state

To assess the season wise prevalence of ticks, total of 708 cattle were screened of which 466 cattle were found to be infested with ixodid ticks during January 2023 -December 2023 showing an overall prevalence of 65.81%. Tick infestation in post monsoon season was 75.46%, in monsoon season was 72.83%, in summer season was 62.24% and in winter season was observed as 62.24%. The highest prevalence of ixodid ticks was noted in post monsoon season followed by monsoon, summer and lowest in winter season in Nagpur district of Maharashtra state. Significant variation was recorded between the prevalence of ticks and various seasons from the Nagpur district of Maharashtra at 0.05 and 0.1 level of significance. No statistically significant difference of tick prevalence between monsoon and post monsoon season was observed. (Table 1).

Species-wise prevalence of ixodid ticks in Nagpur district of Maharashtra State

A total of 3498 ticks were collected to assess the species wise prevalence of ixodid ticks in cattle of which 2034 ticks were morphologically identified as Rhipicephalus spp. with the percent infestation of 58.15% whereas 1464 ticks were identified as Hyalomma spp. with the percent infestation of 41.85%. From Nagpur taluka 50.58% ticks were identified as Rhipicephalus spp. and 49.42% ticks were identified as Hyalomma spp. The percent prevalence of Rhipicephalus spp. and Hyalomma spp. in Kamptee taluka was 54.02% and 45.98% respectively. In Ramtek taluka, 64.79% ticks were belonging to Rhipicephalus spp. however 35.21% ticks were identified as Hyalomma spp. Kalmeshwar taluka showed 52.45% infestation of Rhipicephalus spp. and 47.55% infestation of Hyalomma spp. From Umred taluka, the rate of infestation of Rhipicephalus spp. and Hyalomma spp. was noted as 66.33% and 33.67% respectively (Table 2). Rhipicephalus spp and Hyalomma spp. were the tick species predominantly found to infest the cattle in Nagpur district of Maharashtra State.

Discussion

Many reports on prevalence of ticks in cattle are available in India as well as from abroad. Reviewing of recent literature on prevalence of ixodid ticks in India, Raote (1983) [21] ; Shahardhar et al. (1988) [24] ; Chavhan et al. (2013) [6] ; Tambe (2014) [30] , Thakur et al (2017) [31] and Bharkad (2019) [5] reported tick infestation in cattle with a range of 31.79% to 83.10% from various region of Maharashtra state. Patel et al. (2013) [19] from Mathura; Singh and Rath, (2013) [28] from Punjab; Mandloi et al. (2016) [15] from Indore, Madhya Pradesh; Ghosh et al. (2019) [10] from Mizoram; Negi and Arunachalam (2020) [18] from Uttarakhand and Jaliparthi et al. (2023) [13] from Telangana reported overall prevalence of ixodid tick as 60.07%, 58.06%, 58.87%, 63.39%, 66.32% and 63.4% respectively. Similarly, the research conducted in abroad by Rony et al. (2010) [22] and Asmaa et al. (2014) [2] reported the overall prevalence of ticks as 64.07% in Bangladesh and 60.05% in Egypt respectively. The highest prevalence of 86.15% and 82.41% of ticks was reported by Balasubramanian et al. (2019) [3] from Kerala and Anish et al. (2020) [1] from Andhra Pradesh respectively whereas the lowest prevalence of ixodid ticks of 35.82% was reported by Raote (1983) [21] in Maharashtra, 32.77% by Rajendran and Hafeez (2003) [20] in Andhra Pradesh, 22.40% by Shyma et.al. (2013) in Kerala and 25.53% by Bharkad (2019) [5] . In Maharashtra, Rhipicephalus spp. is most prevalent species reported by Raote (1983) [21] ; Maske (1993) [17] ; Jawale et al. (2012) [14] ; Tambe (2014) [30] and Shahardhar (1988) [24] . Bharkad (2019) [5] reported the high prevalence of tick species as Rhipicephalus (Boophilus) microplus (18.08%), followed by Hyalomma anatolicum (5.97%), Haemaphysalis bispinosa (1.21%) and Rhipicephalus haemaphysaloides (0.27%). The reports of species-wise prevalence of ixodid ticks in present study are in agreement with reporting of research workers in Maharashtra state as well as reports of various states of India. Patel et al. (2013) [19] from Mathura; Dehuri et al. (2017) [8] from Odisha; Debbarma et al. (2018) [7] from West Bengal; Godara et al. (2018) [11] from Jammu region; Ghosh et al. (2019) [10] from Mizoram; Balasubramanian et al. (2019) [3] from Kerala and Anish et al. (2020) [1] from Andhra Pradesh reported Rhipicephalus spp. as a most prevalent species followed by Hyalomma spp. in cattle. However, the results of the present research work are in disagreement with some of the researchers study conducted in India. Jadhao et al. (2020) [12] reported the most prominently infested tick species as Hyalomma anatolicum (68.38%) followed by Rhipicephalus microplus (30.40%) in cattle in the plain region of Chhattisgarh state. The reports of these research workers showed a high prevalence of Hyalomma spp. which is not as per the results of the present study.

Conclusion

The presence of ixodid ticks throughout the year, in the Nagpur district of Maharashtra state showed that the climatic conditions of Nagpur district are favourable for the growth, development and survivability of different life cycle stages of ticks. Rhipicephalus spp. is the most prevalent species in Nagpur district of Maharashtra, may be due to geographical variations, climatic changes and their adaptability. The baseline data obtained during the present study may help to implement the tick control policies in the area.

Acknowledgement

AcknowledgmentsThe authors are thankful to Department of Veterinary Parasitology, Nagpur Veterinary College, Maharashtra Animal and Fishery Sciences University, Nagpur (M.S.) for providing facilities.

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