Morphological and molecular identification of dermanyssus gallinae infesting laying hens in Romania: preliminary data

Abstract

Dermanyssus gallinae (Mesostigmata: Dermanyssidae) is a blood-feeding ectoparasite causing important economic losses, with a high prevalence in poultry farms in Europe. The present study aimed to perform morphological and molecular characterization of D. gallinae infesting laying hens in farms in Southern Romania. The morphological identification of the mites was carried out by using specific keys. All mites morphologically identified as D. gallinae were subjected to molecular analysis by PCR, targeting the nucleotide sequence of ribosomal internal transcribed spacers (ITS) and the mitochondrial cytochrome oxidase subunit I (cox1). The morphological identification of the parasites reveled: the genitoventral shield of parasite posteriorly rounded with one pair of seta; the sternal shield wider than longer; the anal shield with three setae. The PCR reaction returned a single band for each sample of D. gallinae, whose length was 750 bp and 550 bp for of ITS-and cox1-targeting PCR, respectively. Altogether, the findings represent a basis for further studies for a better understanding of the epidemiology of red mites infestation in different types of housing systems used to raise laying hens in Romania.