Animal Health & Veterinary Medicine

Ruminant diarrhea causes mortality and heavy economic losses. Fecal losses of electrolytes in combination with losses of water, reduced dietary intake and probable translocation between intracellular and extra cellular compartments were the main causes of serum electrolytes and trace element changes in diarrheic ruminants. Present study was carried out at different livestock farms i.e. Talha Farm Hadiyara, Muqeem Dairy and goat farm, Burki and different herds in village Deo Sani which is situated in peri urban areas of Lahore for the duration of three months. A total of 100 small ruminants (n=50 sheep; n=50 goats) suffering from clinical diarrhea due to irrespective cause were included in this study. Five sheep and five goats will be kept under negative control. Data was collected from each sheep and goat regarding species, breed, age, sex, temperature, heart rate, housing system, feeding system, body condition score, and fecal score on pre-designed performa. Blood and serum sample was collected from hematology and serum biochemistry for Ca, Cu, Na, Li, K and Fe using hematological analyzer and atomic absorption spectrophotometry respectively. Analysis of variance tests (ANOVA) was used to compare breeds serum electrolytes, trace elements after diarrhea. Ca levels in serum of diarrheic sheep shows the significant difference between breeds, non-significant with age as well as non-significant difference with sex. While in case of goats it showed non-significant difference between breeds, significantly different among age groups and nonsignificantly different between different sexes of diarrheic animals. The serum level of Na increases in case of diarrhea, while K level decreases in small ruminants along with significant co-relation of PCV and copper. In non-diarrheic sheep copper and packed cell volume correlation is significant and correlation is negative, while in case of non-diarrheic goats the correlation is negative and data is insignificant. The serum copper and packed cell volume correlation is significant in case of diarrheic and sheep and goats.