Animal feeds as likely vehicles of clostridial infections in livestock

A total of sixteen samples were collected from various food items on seven farms in three States of Nigeria. These samples yielded thirty one clostridial isolates which were identified as eleven species. The species most frequently isolated was Clostridium perfringens representing 35.5% of the isolates. The next highest was C. bifermentans with a frequency of 22.6%. The other nine species identified were each isolated at frequencies less than 10%. No farm yielded all the species isolated. The farms with the highest distribution of the species of Clostridium were Government Farm, Buruku (Kaduna State), Kano Farm Centre and Government Farm, Butura (Plateau State) with frequency distributions of 36.4% each of the species isolated. Except at the Dairy Cattle Multiplication Centre, Shika (Kaduna State), where the frequency distribution was 27.3%, at none of the other three farms was the distribution more than 20%.