STUDY ON ETHNOVETERINARY PRACTICES IN AMARO SPECIAL DISTRICT SOUTHERN ETHIOPIA

Yibrah Tekle

ABSTRACT

Background: Ethnoveterinary knowledge covers up people’s knowledge, skills, methods, practices and beliefs about the care of their animals and themselves, and has been used over many centuries. Aim: To documented traditional medicinal plants that used to prevent and control ailments in Amaro Special District, Southern Ethiopia. Method: A purposive sampling technique study was carried out usinga semi-structured questionnaire, field observational and survey to document indigenous knowledge. Descriptive statistics were used to analyze and summarize the ethno-botanical data. A total of 24 herbalists aged between 35–69 years old, 71% were over 46years old(elders) and 29% were between 35 and 45 years old(younger). The majority informants were males, 87.5% and the experiences year from 29-32 years were 58.33% and the remaining 41.67% were from 5-20 years. Result: Twenty four medicinal plants against a total of 29 animal and human ailments were reported and botanically identified as belonging to 24 plant families. Most frequently used plants were from Solanaceae (16.67%), Lamiaceae (12.5%), Fabaceae (8.33%), Cucurbitaceae (8.33%) and Asteraceae (8.33%). The medicinal plant parts that were more commonly utilized for the preparation of ethno veterinary medicines were leaves (41.67 %), roots (25%) and bark (12.5%). The findings showed that herbaceous accounted for 41.67%, followed by trees (29.17%), climbers (16.67%) and shrubs (12.5%). 83.33 % of medicinal plants reported were collected from wild habitats and 16.67% from home garden. The preparations were applied through oral administration accounted for (58.3%), followed by topical application (29.17%). The identified and documented medicinal plants predominantly used to animal ailments treatment (65%) and followed by human and animal aliments (both) treatment (25%). Conclusion: The people of the district have sound ethno veterinary knowledge and practices for preventing and controlling their animal and themselves from ailments, but this facing the risk of disappearing due to combined effect factors. So, training on the awareness creation and rising and documentation are highly recommended. Scientific investigations should be carried out to ascertain their effectiveness of the identified medicinal plants used in animal and human health management.

Keywords: Ethnoveterinary practice, Herbalist, Animal ailment Indigenous knowledge, Southern Ethiopia.