Single dosis varying from 10 to 25g/kg of fresh green leaves of Phytolacca decandra were orally force fed to 11 sheep. Two of these sheep (20 and 25g/kg) died 6 hours after the ingestion of the plant and the other 9 got mildly sick and recovered. Another sheep was fed 4 daily dosis of 5g/kg of the same plant. This sheep and another two used as controls did not get sick. The main clinical signs in the affected sheep were abdominal pain, restless, pawing, respiratory distress, muscle tremors, and hyperesthesia. Gross findings in the two necropsied sheep were confined to the digestive tract and consisted of diffuse mucosal reddening of the rumen, reticulum, abomasum, and small intestine. Microscopic changes were coagulative necrosis and microabscesses in the mucosa of the forestomachs and several intratubular birefringent crystals in the kidney.
Phytolacca decandra; poisonous plants; diseases of sheep
