Anthelmintic activity of the white wormwood, Artemisia herba-alba against Heterakis gallinarum infecting turkey poults

Artemisia herba-alba is widely used in the Egyptian folk medicine as vermifuge. The objective of this study was to evaluate the proclaimed anthelmintic efficacy of crude aqueous extracts of A. herba-alba, ACEA, in comparison to albendazole, ABZ, against Heterakis gallinarum infecting turkey poults. 60, 1 day old large white turkey poults (males) were divided into four groups. Group 1 was neither infested nor treated. Groups 2, 3 and 4 were inoculated with 500 embryonated eggs of H. gallinarum at 1 day old. On day 25 post infestation and for three successive days, group 3 was treated with ABZ, 2.5% (20 mg/kg B. wt.) and group 4 was treated with ACEA (0.4 g/kg B. wt.) in drinking water. The whole experiment had been repeated three times. Seven days post treatments, ABZ and CAEA reduce egg output (97.31 and 97.78%, respectively), and worm burden of H. gallinarum (95.08 and 96.07%, respectively). The weight and feed conversion ratios were improved in group 4. Biochemical analysis and histopathological sections revealed the adverse effect of ABZ. ACEA is then considered as a good anthelmintic alternative therapy and recommended in the control of ascaridosis in poultry industry, since it is effective, safe, available and cheap.