Ethnovetrinary

The use of ethno veterinary medicine as prac-ticed among the residents of Arbe Gona and Loka Abaya
woredas has been discussed. The study was conducted using
semi structured questioner, focus group discussion and
personal interviews. The respondents were identified by
stepwise purposive sampling procedures. The study indi-cates that ethno veterinary medicine has been practiced
among the agrarian community in the region since time
immemorial. The results indicate that the practice is mostly
a family affair with the knowledge transferred from the
elders to the youngsters within a family. Thirty seven dif-ferent types of medicinal herbs/plants used in ethno veter-inary drug preparation were identified, the most commonly
used plant part was the leaf followed by other plant parts
viz. xylem, roots, barks etc. Mostly the drugs were used
through oral route. Though topical application, fumigation
and intravenous route of administration of the drugs too are
on record. Twenty two commonly occurring diseases were
identified by the respondents and their treatments too have
been discussed. Use of different parts of several plants in
unison is the common practice. The results also indicated
that the medicinal plants are mostly collected from the wild
and are under threat due to both ecological and anthropo-genic factors and hence need conservation. The study also
revealed that the millennia old practice is under threat due
to lack of enthusiasm from the younger generations to take
up the baton from the elder generation