Abstract
A total of 1012 samples were examined for
Pseudomonas aeruginosa and 257 (25.4%) were positive. The incidence of
Ps. aeruginosa in samples collected from animal sources (N = 730) was significantly higher (28.7%) than that in 282 samples of inanimate sources (16.7%). The percentage of samples infected with these organisms was lowest in poultry feed (2.8%) and highest in sewage effluent (57.1%). Nine serotypes were defined from all sources. P
5 was the common predominant individual O type in infected chicken navels and in the nasal cavities of Najdi sheep (a Saudi Arabian sheep breed), while P
3 and P
6 were predominate in the nasal cavities of Somali sheep (a breed imported from Somalia). No
Ps. aeruginosa serotype was predominant in sheep faeces. In inanimate sources, P
4 was predominant in water and sewage effluent. The isolate from the animal feed was untypeable. In using the slide agglutination technique for serotyping, most of the unusual agglutination reaction types of
Ps. aeruginosa (70%) were of strains isolated from Somali sheep.