Validation of the acaricidal properties of materials used in ethno-veterinary control of cattle ticks

Ticks are vectors of tick-borne diseases, cause teat damage and tick-worry. They are commonly controlled using conventional acaricides, which are expensive to the resource-limited farmers, making them to resort to alternative tick control materials. The objective of this study was to validate the acaricidal properties of various ethno-veterinary materials used by rural farmers in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa. In vitro repellency and contact bio-assay models were carried out to determine the repellency and acaricidal properties of Ptaeroxylon obliquum, Aloe ferox Mill, Lantana camara L, Tagetes minuta, used engine oil and Jeyes fluid on Rhipicephalus sanguineus ticks. The optimum repellency of Jeyes fluid at concentrations of 76.8 and 100% lasted for 6 and 7 h, respectively. Tabard the reference product lasted for 4 h. P. obliquum (40%) repelled the ticks for 40 min. For the contact bio-assay, used engine oil, T. minuta oil (50%), Ektoban ® and Jeyes fluid (76.8%) caused tick mortality of more than 86%. This study reveals that the materials rural farmers use to control ticks vary in their efficacy. Jeyes fluid and used engine oil have acaricidal effect as the conventional acaricides whereas extracts of A. ferox, L. camara and T. minuta are not.