author(s)
TA Vijayalingam, NV Rajesh and S Ilavarasan

abstract
A quail farm at Dharkavalasai had two times of disease occurrence during October 2018 and November 2018 with 38% and 61.3% mortality respectively. A farm maintained at Kalugoorani had experienced the same disease condition during December 2018 with 80% mortality. All the affected flocks of Japanese quails were maintained under deep litter system. The birds at the age group of 9 to 12 weeks suffered much and the birds at laying stage showed higher mortality. The symptoms noticed were droopiness, ruffled feathers, weakness, in appetence, soiled vent with greenish white watery diarrhoea in both the farms. On necropsy the bodily condition was thin, body cavity contained little amount of serosanguineous clear fluid. Intestine was ballooned with congestion of serosal vessels. Intestinal mucosa was found to be eroded and the lumen contained mucosanguineous material mixed with desquamated materials. The intestinal wall was very thin. In some cases the liver and spleen were congested and enlarged. Cultural examination of intestinal contents showed black coloured colonies suggestive of Clostridium colinum infection. Direct microscopic examination of the intestinal content showed no oocysts /schizonts of coccidial organism. Therapeutic management of the condition in the farm at Dharkavalasai, with 2.5g of Tetracyclin powder (Tetracyclin Hydrochloride, Intervet®) in 1litre of drinking water for 5 days did not yield encouraging response. Megadox-N (Doxycycline with Neomycin water soluble powder) @ 1 gm in 5 litres of water for 5 days showed a slight improvement in controlling the mortality. However the problems were found to relapse. The treatment with LINCO-N (Lincomycin Hcl with Neomycin Powder) in feed @ 250 gm/ metric ton of feed for a continuous period of 1 week could completely stop the mortality. Hence, the second incidence at Kalugoorani was also treated with LINCO-N in the same dose rate and succeeded. In the adoptive period it was advised to treat the flocks with Ethnoveterinary medicinal preparations and insisted to follow strict bio-safety measures.