ABSTRACT

Small ruminants, provide about 30% of meat consumed in Nigeria (Sackey, 1998), yet the protein intake per day per person is still low, 19gm/head/day (FAO, 1997; Sackey et al., 2004). Production of small ruminants by the common farmer is beset by many factors, which include poor nutrition, management, disease and parasitism. While poor nutrition is considered the most critical factor, parasites constitutes a major source of economic loss. Internal parasites have been shown to reduce feed intake, and accordingly, to reduce growth rates by up to 30% or more (Bakunzi and Serumaga, 2000; Pereze etal., 2003). Parasites have become a serious problem to small ruminant farmers. The difficulty of devising and introducing non-chemical means of parasite control has contributed to our over-dependence on drugs and this situation made resistance even more difficult to manage (Coles, 2001; Fakae et al., 2004). Most gastrointestinal parasites have become resistant to the commonly used drugs found in the market. Probably due to the cost-effective gains in productivity expected to accrue in the short term, which has led to the predominance of chemotherapy. In terms of economic loss, these gastrointestinal parasitic diseases have caused unquantifiable monetary loss (Brander et a/.,1991; Sangster, 2001). The use of conventional anthelmintics by 2 small ruminant farmers has become very difficult due to the high cost of these drugs in the open market (Chiezey et al., 2000) and this has compelled farmers to resort to alternative means of ethno-veterinary medicine (EVM) to safeguard the health of their animals (Jagun et at., 1997; Alawa et al., 2000) or animals are left to fend for themselves, which eventually lead to the death of these animals (Troney, 1989; Bakunzi and Serumaga-Zake, 2000).