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1 July 2002 VIROLOGIC INVESTIGATIONS OF FREE-LIVING EUROPEAN BISON (BISON BONASUS) FROM THE BIALOWIEZA PRIMEVAL FOREST, POLAND
Kerstin Borchers, Jens Brackmann, Olaf Wolf, Michael Rudolph, Peter Glatzel, Matgorzata Krasinska, Zbingniew A. Krasinski, Kai Frölich
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Abstract

We conducted virologic investigations on postmortem specimens from 261 free-living European bison (Bison bonasus) from the Bialowieza Primeval Forest, Poland collected between 1990 and 2000. Fifty-four of 94 males had balanoposthitis; none of the 167 female bison examined had reproductive tract lesions. Peripheral blood, swabs, and various tissues were analyzed for bovine viruses as well as for viral DNA by bovine herpesvirus 1 (BoHV-1) and bovine herpesvirus 4 (BoHV-4) specific polymerase chain reaction (PCR) technique. An infectious bovine rhinotracheitis like BoHV-1 strain was isolated from the spleen of a female bison calf and additionally was detected by nested PCR from splenic tissue. None of the bison had significant antibody titers against BoHV-1, bovine herpesvirus 2, BoHV-4, caprine herpesvirus 1, cervid herpesvirus 1, or bovine viral diarrhea (BVD) virus-1. However, low antibody titers in two animals indicate that this European bison population has been exposed to BVD virus or BVD-like viruses and BoHV-2.

Borchers, Brackmann, Wolf, Rudolph, Glatzel, Krasinska, Krasinski, and Frölich: VIROLOGIC INVESTIGATIONS OF FREE-LIVING EUROPEAN BISON (BISON BONASUS) FROM THE BIALOWIEZA PRIMEVAL FOREST, POLAND
Kerstin Borchers, Jens Brackmann, Olaf Wolf, Michael Rudolph, Peter Glatzel, Matgorzata Krasinska, Zbingniew A. Krasinski, and Kai Frölich "VIROLOGIC INVESTIGATIONS OF FREE-LIVING EUROPEAN BISON (BISON BONASUS) FROM THE BIALOWIEZA PRIMEVAL FOREST, POLAND," Journal of Wildlife Diseases 38(3), 533-538, (1 July 2002). https://doi.org/10.7589/0090-3558-38.3.533
Received: 16 April 2001; Published: 1 July 2002
KEYWORDS
Balanoposthitis
Bison bonasus
BoHV-1
bovine herpesvirus 1
European bison
polymerase chain reaction
survey
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