A comparative study on the use of selective media for the enumeration of Clostridium perfringens in poultry faeces

Isolation and fast detection of Clostridium perfringens is essential in veterinary medical diagnostics and veterinary research, as it allows to recommend suitable treatment options after antimicrobial resistance determination, and is essential to study pathogenesis. In this study four selective media were tested for the enumeration of, and selectivity towards C. perfringens in faecal samples from poultry. The routinely used Columbia agar with 5% sheep (CBA), Shahidi-Ferguson-perfringens agar (SFP), tryptose sulphite cycloserine agar (TSC), and a novel chromogenic medium, CHROMagar™ C. perfringens (CHCP), were tested. Overall, no difference in C. perfringens recovery could be observed between the selective media. The limit of quantification was 10³ CFU/mL for all agars. CHCP showed the highest specificity, especially when low C. perfringens loads were present in the faeces, with TSC being the second most specific selective medium. Both CBA and SFP allowed considerable growth of other faecal microbiota and were not specific for C. perfringens. On CHCP, differentiation of C. perfringens from other faecal bacteria was straightforward due to the appearance of C. perfringens as orange colonies, with other bacteria being absent or appearing as blue/green colonies. On TSC, C. perfringens appeared as black colonies, but longer incubation periods were sometimes needed for the black colour to develop. Therefore, CHCP can be recommended when timely and easy identification and enumeration of C. perfringens from complex samples, such as faeces, is needed.