A Trichostrongylid is gastrointestinal nematode which causes the heavy economic losses to the livestock particularly sheep. A total 240 gastrointestinal tracts of sheep from district Zhob abattoir were collected. These samples were isolated and identified for trichostrongylid nematodes. The overall prevalence was 50%(120/240), of which 39.1% in male and 60.8% in female sheep were recorded at slaughter-house. Plants were collected from area of district Zhob. These plants were Identified and authenticated by botanist .The crude aqueous methanolic extract of the plants were used for in-vivo studies. Eighty sheep of either sex, aged between three to six months and naturally infested with Trichostrongylid nematodes (including trichostrongylius spp. I-Iaemonchus contortus, cooperia etc) were selected and managed separately for the experiment. These sheep were divided into 4 groups A ,B,C and D. Group A was contained 10 sheep and was untreated and considered as control. Thirty (30) were kept in Group B, were further sub divided into three equal groups i.e. BI, B2 and B3 and treated with different levels of Chenopodium album @ 1, 2 and 3 g/kg body weight respectively. Group C having thirty (30) was also sub divided into three equal groups i.e. Cl, C2 and C3 and treated with different levels of Artemisia brevifolia @ 1, 2 and 3g/kg body weight respectively. Group D was treated with Levamisole @ 7.5 mg/kg body weight. Faecal egg count reduction was criterion for evaluation. Faecal samples were collected before treatment on day 0 and on day 3, 5, 7, 10 and 14 post treatments for EPG count.

The results of EPG for animals in group B1 at day 0 was 1325. This rate was reduced to 1250, 1125, 995 and 702 at day 3, 7, 10 and 14, respectively. Similarly EPG of sheep in B2 were 1280 at day 0 and reduced to 1205, 1202, 1001 and finally to 690 at day 3, 7, 10 and 14 respectively. Best results in B group against the nematodes were in B3 in which Chenopodium album was used 3g/kg bw. The results were 1250, 1231, 1145, 590 EPG at day 0, 3, 7, 10 and 14. The sheep in group Cl showed 1203 EPG at day 0, when treated with Ig/kg bwArtemisia brevifolia, the EPG was reduced to 1173, 1115, 700 and 528 on day 3, 7, 10 and 14 respectively. Second level of treatment C2 of

Artemisia brevifolia which was given @ 2g/kg bw initially contained reduced to 1202 EPG, on day 3, 7, 10 and 14 the EPG counts were 1020, 631, 546 and 459, respectively.

Highest dose of Artemisia brevfolia was 3g/kg body weight to sheep in group C3. On day zero the EPG count was 1196. On day 3, 7, 10 and 14th day the EPG count decreased to 1079, 905, 528 and 396 respectively. The sheep in group D, treated with recommended dose of Levamisole showed 1138 EPG prior to medication, which reduced remarkably to 681, 536, 357 and 147 on day 3, 7, 10 and 14 respectively. Although no untoward effects of plants were observed but best EPG reduction results (87.08 %) were observed in Levamisole as compared to treatment of 3gm/kg b.w Chenopodium album (51 .03 %) and Artemisia hrevfolia 3g/kgbw (66.88 %).

CONCLUSIONS

A wide variety of plants are naturally available in the Indo-Pakistan subcontinent which possess narrow or broad spectrum anthelmintic activities. No doubt this is true in other regions of the world as well where gastrointestinal parasitism is an important problem in livestock keeping, and the availability of commercial drugs may be limited. Conventionally, trichostrongylids has been tackled with use of synthetic anthelmintic but owning to development of anthelmintic resistance against major groups of anthelmintics viz., benzimidazole, Levamisole and avermectins, people are looking for alternatives to synthetic chemicals.
The phytochemical analysis of these plants and controlled anthelmintic trials along with contemporary knowledge of parasite control strategies may offer new opportunities for effective and economical control of parasitic diseases. So these plants can be better alternative for synthetic chemicals.

Quality control extracts of Artemisia brevifolia and Chenopodium album or possibly isolated bioactive compounds could be a promising alternative to conventional anthelmintics fbr the treatment of gastrointestinal trichostrongylids of small ruminants in the future. Such a treatment could be used in control strategies against gastro intestinal nernatodes in organic and conventional production systems. Further research is needed for studies on the bio active constituents, as well as on the reproducibility, dosage, application regime. toxicity and effectiveness of Artemisia brevifolia and C'henopodium a/bums in other host species and against other economically important gastro intestinal nematodes species.

RECOMMENDATIONS

It is recommended that further research could be carried out on large sample size in different seasons of the year and large number of plants, identification of active principles of plants with proven anthelmintic activity, standardization of dose and toxicity studies for drug development. In addition to this, large number of samples of the same plant from different geographic areas should be subjected to experimentation keeping in view the possibility of differences in chemical composition of soils.