ALPACA PARASITES

The Mid North Coast of NSW is paradise on earth for parasites of domestic animals; its warm humid climate promotes rapid development of large numbers of them; particularly nematodes. These parasites are a major cause of problems in alpacas in this area, and are a major contributor to “failure to thrive” syndrome. An understanding of the worm’s biology assists in managing the problem.

Image from www.mdc.edu

These worms have a simple lifecycle. The adults live in the gut, and in large numbers will cause significant protein and blood loss. Egg production is high from these worms; eggs are released in the manure, and pasture contamination occurs. The eggs hatch into larvae, which wriggle around randomly on the soil and up blades of grass until they are eaten by another alpaca, and the life cycle is complete. Huge numbers of eggs can be passed by infected animals. We often obtain faecal egg counts exceeding 5,000 eggs per gram. Assuming an alpaca passes 1kg of dung a day, this equates to 5 million potential worms being spread on the paddock!! Obviously, with large numbers of alpacas on small acres, pasture contamination will be significant, worm burdens will far exceed the animal’s natural immunity, and disease will result. Therefore, we need to rely on worm treatments on most farms. Organic alpaca farming is a challenge in this area.

Pasture management is important (keeping stocking rates down, rotating paddocks), however, in this area it is almost impossible to achieve a “safe” pasture by spelling; we just don’t get sufficient hot prolonged dry weather to kill the larvae. Dung piling can assist with management of worms if manure collection can be done; this can be useful in smallholdings. However, high stocking rates over-rides piling behaviour.

Treatments: talk to your local vet to see what drenches work in your area. We find Closal to be a very useful drench, and haven’t seen much resistance yet. At high risk times of the year (wet hot & humid), drenches need to be done every 6 weeks. Faecal egg counts can be used as a guide to treatments. Some local farmers are treating every 2 months, irrespective of faecal egg counts.
Tapeworms are certainly present in young alpacas, and can be treated with Alben. These worms have a totally different lifecycle, and their significance is not really known in alpacas.
Be aware that no commercial drenches are registered for use in alpacas. This doesn’t mean that they don’t work, it just means that sufficient studies have not been done in alpacas, so the manufacturer is not responsible for failures or adverse reactions to their product when used “off label”.