Abstract:
The piggery enterprise under livestock sector is also growing in certain regions due to improved production technologies however; one of the biggest difficulties has been in the control of gastrointestinal nematodes that consequently lead to economic losses and low productivity. In this context, it becomes necessary to search for easily accessible and low-cost forms of treatment such as cassava leaf powder that has condensed tannins which is the active principle with anti-helminthic effect. In that regard, the efficacy of the use of cassava leaf powder in the control of nematodes in pigs was evaluated. The trial was conducted in kyere town council, Serere district.
Twenty weaned piglets were used carrying natural infection by Nematodes, verified by counting the number of eggs per gram of feces (OPG). The piglets were divided into 3 treatments and a control: T1 (dewormed with cassava leaf powder 0.5% using 50g / kg); T2(dewormed with cassava leaf powder at 1% using 100g/kg), T3 (dewormed piglets with 1.5% using 150g/kg), T4 (dewormed with Albendazole), according to the manufacturer’s instructions. The data obtained was analyzed in the statistical package GenStat. The calculation of efficacy was based on the percentage of reduction through the statistical package. As a result, it was observed that T2 (1%) and T3 (1.5%) had a better reduction capacity with an efficacy of 73.1% and 70.6% respectively as compared to Albendazole which obtained 58.8%. It can be concluded that cassava leaf powder has anti-helminthic efficacy in the control of Nematodes and is also feasible in reducing costs of constant reacquisition of conventional dewormers and can be an alternative for use in pig farms. From the results of this trials, cassava leaf powder is effective in controlling Nematodes and further research needs to be done to identify and quantify the active components in the leaf powder that degrades the Nematodes.
