Ferreira, L.E., França, S.C., Taleb-Contini, S.H., Chagas, A.C.S. and Beleboni, R.O.
Department of Biotechnology, Ribeirão Preto University (UNARER), Brazil
The sheep farming is traditionally practiced worldwide as a promising economic activity. However, the general unpreparedness of the breeders in the management of animals has contributing to the development of gastrointestinal infections mainly caused by Haemonchus contortus species. H. contortus sheep infections have been related to serious economic losses on sheep farming and the irregular or erroneous administration of traditional anthelmintic drugs has been associated to the resistance development. Ethnopharmacological information has appointed the Lavandula officinalis essential oil as a promising alternative for development of new anthelmintic products. Thus, the main aim of this work was to investigate the popular use of essential oil of L. officinalis with emphasis on its potential anthelmintic effects against H. contortus. According our best results, L. officinalis essential oil showed 92.3% and 40.6% of efficacy in egg hatch and larval motility tests, respectively. In the adult worm motility test, 85% of worms were completely immobilized within the first 6 hours of nematode exposition to different dilutions of oil. Phytochemical analysis revealed the presence of linalool (36.01%), sabinene (31.1%) and 1,8-cineol (5.61%) as the most important compounds, which may be responsible for anthelmintic essential oil activity.
Keywords: Anthelmintic; Ethnopharmacology; Gastrointestinal infections; Sheep.