Studies on Effects of Exercise on Complete Blood Count of Horses (Equus caballus) in Khartoum State

Abstract

This study was conducted at El khawjia Farm –Khartoum North during the period may 2017 to evaluate the effect of exercise on the complete blood count (CBC) of Equus caballus. Four mature non pregnant, non lactating and not on estrous mares were used. The exercise program was 30 minutes moderate running, in an area of 1600 m2. Blood samples were taken from the jugular vein in tubes containing EDTA. Blood samples were taken before exercise, immediately post exercise and an hour post exercise.CBC was determined by an automated blood cell counter. The collected data were analyzed by ANOVA test using Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS16.0). The result showed that horses, immediately post exercise, had significantly higher (P≤0.05) values than before exercise for erythrocytes count (7.27±1.40 vs. 6.44±0.69) (x1012/L), hemoglobin concentration (Hb g/dl), (13.46±1.50 vs .11.58 ±1.22), Hematocrit (HCT%), (38.61±7.68 vs. 34.12±4.72), total leucocytes count (10.36±2.09 vs. 9.56±1.21) (x109/L), lymphocytes percentage( 8.26±4.86 vs.6.68±3.63) (x109/L) and lower values for platelets count (75.82±34.49 vs. 93.797±31.92) (x109/L) respectively. The animals, at an hour post exercise, registered the following mean values for RBCs(6.42±0.63),Hb(11.34±1.38),HCT(34.19±4.98), WBCs(9.17±1.33), lymphocytes (5.83±2.50)% and platelets coun(91.50±29.86) which are significantly different from both the values that were recorded before exercise and immediately post exercise. However exercise did not cause any significant variations in the rest of the studied CBC parameters that is mean corposcular volume (MCV fl), mean corposcular hemoglobin (MCH pg), mean corposcular hemoglobin concentration , red cell distribution width standard deviation (RDW-SD fl), red distribution width coefficient (RDW-CV %), lymphocytes (LYM %), maximum immature ditribution (MID %), granulocyte (GRAN %), plateletcrit (PCT %), VII platelet distribution width (PDW fl), platelets large cell ratio (PLCR %). It is concluded that moderate exercise causes some changes in horses CBC and they will not return to the values before exercise after having an hour of rest.