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Assessment of the impact of plant species composition and drought stress on survival of strongylid third-stage larvae in a greenhouse experiment

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Abstract

Grazing livestock is always exposed to infective parasite stages. Depending on the general health status of the animal, the farm management, environmental conditions and pasture exposure, the impact ranges from non-affected to almost moribund animals. The greenhouse experiment was performed to investigate how climatic changes and plant composition influence the occurrence/survival of strongylid third-stage larvae (L3) on pasture. Ten different types of plant species compositions (eight replicates for each) were inoculated with approximately 10,000 Cooperia oncophora L3. The different plant compositions can be assorted to two groups: without legume content and with legume content (52–62 % legume content). Half of the replicates were watered adequately, while the other half was hold under drought stress (DS), mimicking longer dry periods. During the DS cycles, the respective containers were not watered until they reached the wilting point. Grass samples were taken 1, 4 and 6 weeks after inoculation, soil samples were taken only once after 6 weeks and all samples were examined for occurrence of L3. After the second DS cycle, the number of L3 present on herbage samples was reduced significantly. The higher the legume content of the pasture composition, the higher is the L3 occurrence on pasture. Independent of the watering scheme, the soil served as the most important reservoir with consistently higher numbers of L3 in the soil compared to herbage.

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Acknowledgments

We gratefully thank KLIFF (Niedersächsisches Ministerium für Wissenschaft und Kultur, Germany) for initiation and support of the study, the University of Göttingen and Prof. Isselstein for providing the greenhouse and the over years established containers and Oliver Katschke for helping to examine the 240 soil samples. We also acknowledge the financial support from the GLOWORM (KBBE 2011.1.3-04, No 288975) project.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute for Parasitology and Tropical Veterinary Medicine, Freie Universität Berlin, Robert-von-Ostertag-Str. 7-13, 14163, Berlin, Germany

    Friederike Knapp-Lawitzke, Georg von Samson-Himmelstjerna & Janina Demeler

  2. Department of Crop Sciences, Institute of Grassland Science, Georg-August-University Göttingen, von-Siebold-Str. 8, 37075, Göttingen, Germany

    Frank Küchenmeister & Kai Küchenmeister

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  1. Friederike Knapp-Lawitzke
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  2. Frank Küchenmeister
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  4. Georg von Samson-Himmelstjerna
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  5. Janina Demeler
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Correspondence to Janina Demeler.

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Knapp-Lawitzke, F., Küchenmeister, F., Küchenmeister, K. et al. Assessment of the impact of plant species composition and drought stress on survival of strongylid third-stage larvae in a greenhouse experiment. Parasitol Res 113, 4123–4131 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00436-014-4084-5

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