الفهرس 
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Abstract
This study is conducted to detect the helminth parasites which infect some Egyptian desert animals using both light and scanning electron microscopy. A total of 167 specimens of desert animals were collected mostly alive from three locations at Burg El Arab (south west Alexandria), El Hammam (about 60 km south Alexandria), Al Dabaa (50 km north of Mersa Matrouh).
The collected animals belonged to three species of reptiles (Agama stellio, A. spinosa and Eumeces Schneideri) and two species of rodents (Gerbillus gerbillus and Jaculus orientalis). Nine species of helminths were recovered from different hosts including three species of cestodes (Meggittina gerbilli, Oochoristica mutabili and O. crotaphyti) and 6 species of nematodes. The recovered nematode species were Pharyngodon mamillatus, Parapharyngodon bulbosus, P. micipsae, Physaloptera leptosoma, P. varani and P. paradoxa). In the present study the taxonomic position and the morphological criteria were discussed for all the collected species.
Results
This study has focused on the identification of the parasite communities that infect some desert animals in Egypt, and also their morphological features and estimation of their infection rates. The study detected the existence of nine species of parasitic helminths belong to five different genera in the desert animals as follows:
Meggettina gerbilli from Gerbillus gerbillus (36%) – Oochoristica mutabili from Agama stellio (25.7%) – Oochoristica croaphyti from Agama stellio (18.5%) – Pharyngodon mamillatus from Eumeces Schneideri (81.5%) – Parapharyngodon bulbosus from Agama stellio (80%) – Prapharyngodon micipsae from Agama stellio (80%) – Physaloptera varani from Agama spinosa (60%) – Physaloptera paradoxa from Agama spinosa (60%) and physaloptera leptosoma from Agama spinosa (80%).
This study confirmes that the infection prevalence rates are much higher in the summer, than in the winter months. It is also expected that this study may lead to a better understanding of the rates of prevalence of these parasites in their desert animals; it also opens the door for further studies on the host–parasite interactions.