Prevalence of mouse and rat parasites in resource recovery plants, farms and housing areas of Southern Selangor: implication for public health

Parasites of small mammals living in human areas cause a tremendous burden of vector borne disease. Small mammals infected with parasites can readily facilitate parasitic transmission to humans and other susceptible animal hosts. The objective of this study was to determine the presence of parasites in small mammals (rats and mice) from the Semenyih Recovery Plant (RESBS) and to compare this with parasites from a plantation farm, Ladang Pertanian Bersepadu, Universiti Putra Malaysia (LPB UPM), and a housing area, Sri Serdang housing area (SSHA), Selangor, Malaysia. The methods employed in this study was to trap small mammals in the resource recovery plant, the plantation farm and the housing area. All the captured small mammals were examined microscopically for the presence of endo and ectoparasites. The brine gravity floatation method was used to determine the presence of parasitic eggs in the feces of the small mammals. The staining method of Semichon’s acetic carmine was employed to find the parasites infesting the internal organs of the mammals. Twenty-three small mammals were trapped alive in the study. Rattus sabanus (10) and Suncus murinus (2) were captured in the Semenyih resource recovery plant; Rattus argentiventer (7) in the farm area of Ladang Pertanian Bersepadu UPM and Mus musculus (1) and Suncus murinus (3) species in the Sri Serdang housing area. R. sabanus, R. argentiventer and M. musculus were found to be heavily infected with Echinolaelaps echidinus (mites). Polyplax spinulosa (lice) infected the R. sabanus species. The intestinal parasite, cestode Hymenolepididae tapeworm, was found to have invaded the small mammals from Semenyih, the resource recovery plant and the farm area of Ladang Pertanian Bersepadu UPM. The nematodes were also found in the small mammals from RESBS. The small mammals captured from RESBS were found to be heavily infected with both external and internal parasites including E. echidinus, P. spinulosa, cestode tapeworms and nematodes compared to the farm and housing areas. Therefore, the existence of small mammals carrying parasites found mainly in waste disposal areas needs to be addressed to prevent serious disease that can cause harm to human health

Morphological and allozyme studies of small terrestrial snails( Opeas sp., Subulina sp., and Huttonella bicolor) collected from Peninsular Malaysia

Shell morphological characters and allozyme electrophoresis were used to study the relationships among six geographical populations of land snails collected from Peninsular Malaysia. Allozyme electrophoresis was used to study the genetic variations to complement the morphological features studied that included shell lengths, numbers of whorls and shell colour. Ten loci coding for six enzymes (MDH, LAP, ALP, PGM, G6PDH, and EST) could be reliably scored in samples from the six populations studied. The dendrogram showed two major clusters with one cluster comprising Subulinidae populations from Perak, Selangor, Johor, Terengganu, and Pahang while the other cluster included only the Streptaxidae Huttonella bicolor (red) population. The Subulinidae populations were grouped into two subclusters: one subcluster included the Subulina sp. populations from Perak, Selangor, and Johor, while the other subcluster included the Opeas sp. populations from Terengganu and Pahang. Morphological features can identify the different families ant therefore they can complement the allozyme genetic studies on the land snail populations. Like other reports in the literature, our results also underline the importance of a genetic approach in conjunction with a morphological approach, for discriminating land snail species. The present results suggest that small land snails, which were similar in colour but different in sizes, were not of the same family/genus

Sensorial characteristics of meat of japanese quails, coturnixcoturnduaponica fed with ration containing snail meal

Seven hundreds of day old Japanese quails (Coturnix coturnix japonica) were obtained from a quail hatchery and breeding farm in Taiping, Perak State to be placed in wire mesh battery cages and fed with varying content of snail meal (Pomacea insularis) ranging from 0 (control), 2.5, 5, and 7.5% diet. All the rations contained 26% crude protein (CP) and approximately 2.800 kcal/kg of ME. For comparison separate birds were fed with commercial feed. Drinking water was provided ad libitum. All birds were reared up to six weeks old before being slaughtered to obtain their carcass for the sensorial test in the Department of Food Science, Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM) to evaluate the flavor, juiciness, tenderness, colour, satisfaction and general appearance of the meat. Fourteen panelists, mostly students of UPM, were involved in the sensorial test. Cooked quail meat from breast part was served together with a form of palatability test with scoring system from 1 to 8. The results showed that the meat of bird that fed with ration containing snail meal were not significantly different from the meat fed with commercial diet except that the meat was less juicer. Since snail meal contained high crude protein (32.0%) and mineral especially calcium (26.3%), it could be used for animal feed as a source of protein and mineral. Level of snail meal in the ration (up to 7.5%) did not influence the sensorial characteristics of quail meat. (Key words: Snail meal, Quail, Meat, Sensorial characteristic

Distribution of heavy metal concentrations in the different soft tissues of the freshwater snail Pomacea insularum (DOrbigny, 1839; Gastropoda), and sediments collected from polluted and unpolluted sites from Malaysia.

Pomacea insularum were collected from polluted and unpolluted freshwater ecosystems in Malaysia. Besides the shells, the soft tissues were dissected and pooled into cephalic tentacle, foot, mantle, operculum, digestive tract, penial sac,lung sac, and remainder. These tissues were analyzed for the concentrations of Cu, Cd, Fe, Ni, and Zn. The present work resulted in three interesting findings. First, the concentrations of Cu, Cd, Fe, and Zn found in most of the different parts of P. insularum collected from the polluted Juru River were significantly (P50.05) higher than those found in the snails from the other four sites. Second, positive and significant correlation coefficients were found for sediment-lung sac for Cd, Fe, and Zn while sediment-digestive tract for Cu. These correlation results indicated that lung sacs could reflect the environmental concentrations of Cd, Fe, and Zn, while the digestive tract could do the same for Cu. Third, the different concentrations of heavy metals found in the different parts indicated different metal regulation and binding sites in these organs. The significant correlation coefficients between different tissues indicated that they might be caused by similar metal regulation and sequestration. Based on the above findings, P. insularum are a potential biomonitor of Cd, Cu, Fe, and Zn pollution in freshwater ecosystems