Experimental studies of chlamydiosis in Japanese quails

Two-week-old Japanese quails were infected intratracheally with six strains of Chlamydia psittaci isolated from calf pneumonia, swine pneumonia, goat abortion, sheep abortion, kid enteritis, and calf conjunctivitis, respectively. The Japanese quails from infected and control groups were closely observed for clinical symptoms. In order to examine the gross and microscopic lesions, quails in each group were sacrificed at 2, 5, 7, 10, 14, 21 and 30 days post infection. Alterations induced by pneumonic strains were more severe than those found in abortion isolates whereas the isolate of conjunctivitis failed to induce any lesion in the quail. Chlamydia psittaci was successfully recovered from lungs, spleen and intestinal contents of sacrificed quails. Calf pneumonia and goat abortion strains could be propagated in quails for a longer period (30 days), than in swine pneumonia, sheep abortion, kid enteritis (15 days each) and calf conjunctivitis isolates (7 days). The control quails were normal and no isolation could be made from them.