On the Life History, Growth and Development from the Metacercarial Stage to Adulthood, of Clinostomum tilapiae Ukoli, 1966

Abstract

The experimental infection of young cattle egrets with metacercarial cysts of Clinostomum tilapiae Ukoli, 1966 from Tilapia spp. is described.A table showing the duration of infection, the number of parasites recovered, the percentage of infection and the location of the parasites within the host is constructed and the results discussed.A graph of mean length and breadth of body, oral and ventral suckers, cirrus pouch, ovary and anterior testis, is plotted against the duration of infection in days. Most of these dimensions are found to attain a peak two days after infection. It is also found that while the ovary increases in size with age, the cirrus pouch remains constant, so that in mature adults, both are about equal in size,It is shown, by plotting length of organs against length of body and by expressing mean measurements of certain dimensions as percentages of body length, that apart from the testes, all the other organs in both the metacercariae and the adults maintain a constant relationship both with one another and with body length as they grow older.