Vector collection and diversity at LMs and SHs
A total of 456 ticks (434 adults and 22 nymphs), 28 lice
(Haematopinus suis ), and two fleas (Ct.felis ) collected from cattle, goats, sheep, and pigs at LMs and
SHs were analysed in this study. Over 80% of the vectors collected at
LMs and SHs came from cattle (Supplementary Table 2). This was partially
due to the fact that 60% of the animals sampled at each of these
locations were cattle, which were generally more tick-infested than
goats, sheep, or pigs. The lice were primarily collected from pigs at
SHs and the fleas were collected from cattle.
Representative specimens of Rhipicephalus evertsi (one adult),Rhipicephalus appendiculatus (one adult, one nymph),Amblyomma gemma (one adult), Amblyomma variegatum (one
adult, one nymph), Haemaphysalis sp. (one adult), Rhipicephalus decoloratus (one adult), and Rhipicephalus spp. (six adults, one nymph), identified morphologically (Supplementary
Figure 1), were selected for molecular tick identification (Table 1).
Molecular identifications concurred with morphological identifications
for Rh. appendiculatus (T16), Rh. decoloratus (T134), and Am. variegatum (T199). However, we resolved a tick specimen
(T105) that we morphologically identified as Rh. decoloratus to
be Rh. microplus based on its 16S rRNA sequence homology. The
ITS2 sequence of an Am. gemma (T222) had highest homology with Am. hebraeum, as there were no other Am. gemma ITS2
reference in the GenBank database. Seven out of nine specimens of Rhipicephalus, Haemaphysalis, and Amblyomma spp.
that could not be identified to species level by morphology alone were
identified based on sequence homologies of at least two of the markers.
The most commonly sampled tick species were Rh. decoloratus (35%) and Am. variegatum (30%).