CHARACTERIZATION OF PORCINE HEMOPHILI ISOLATED FROM AUSTRALIAN PIGS BETWEEN 1988 AND 1992

A total of 362 haemophili, isolated from pigs throughout Australia, were characterised by phenotypic properties. Most were identified as Actinobacillus pleuropneumoniae (296 isolates) or Haemophilus parasuis (52 isolates). The remaining isolates were identified as Haemophilus Taxon 'minor group' (12 isolates) and Haemophilus Taxon D (two isolates). All 296 A pleuropneumoniae isolates were serotyped by slide agglutination and/or gel diffusion, using rabbit antisera against all 12 recognised serovars. Of these, only 156 (52.7%) could be assigned to a single serovar as follows: serovar 1 - 85 isolates, serovar 2 - 4 isolates, serovar 3 - 2 isolates, serovar 5 - 10 isolates, serovar 7 - 51 isolates, serovar 11 - 2 isolates and serovar 12 - 2 isolates. Of the remaining 140 isolates, 91 gave cross-reactions with serovars 3 and 6, one cross-reacted with serovars 9 and 10, one cross-reacted with serovars 9 and 11 whereas 47 gave no reaction with any of the antisera.