Evaluation of lethal effect of aqueous and hydroalcoholic extracts of Achillea talagonica on the Emeria maxima oocysts in vitro

Avian coccidiosis is one of the most expensive infectious diseases in poultry. Achillea talagonica is one of the plants which due to its anti-inflammatory, antimicrobial and anti-oxidant properties have been applied from ancient times for the treatment of parasitic diseases. So, this study aimed to assess the efficiency of the Achillea talagonica aqueous and hydroalcoholic extracts, on Eimeria maxima oocysts in vitro. The oocysts used in this study were obtained by challenging the 14th day-old broiler chicks with 75,000 oocysts of E. maxima. To obtain sporulated oocsts, 9 g of stool samples were soaked in 2% Potassium bichromate and incubated at 27 ° C for 72 hrs. The harvested oocysts (sporulated or unsporulated) were then exposed to the 1, 2 and 5% concentration of aqueous or hydroalcoholic herbal extracts at 25 - 28⁰C for 48 hrs. Thereafter, number of Sporulated and unsporulated of oocytes were counted at 1, 12, 24 and 48 hours. In order to prevent any error in the results, the experiment was repeated three times. The results showed that both extract in all concentration were able to reduce the number of sporulated and unsporulated of oocytes compared with control (p