Natural Anaplasmataceae infection in Rhipicephalus bursa ticks collected ă from sheep in the French Basque Country

International audienceRhipicephalus bursa is one of 79 species of the genus Rhipicephalus in ă the family of Ixodidae. In this study, we investigated Anaplasmataceae ă bacteria associated with R. bursa collected after an epizootic outbreak ă of ovine anaplasmosis. 76 adult ticks, (60 male and 16 female ticks), ă were removed from sheep in two farms and all identified as R. bursa, all ă females were partially engorged. We found that 50% of the ticks were ă positive in the initial Anaplasmataceae qPCR screening. Bacterial ă species was identified by analyzing the sequences of amplicons of 23S ă rRNA, groEL and rpoB genes. 22.4% of ticks contained DNA of Anaplasma ă phagocytophilum and 7.9% the DNA of Anaplasma ovis. Based on 23S rRNA ă and groEL genes analysis, we found that 19.7% of ticks contained a ă potentially new species of Ehrlichia. We propose the status of ă Candidatus for this uncultured species and we provisionally name it ă Candidatus Ehrlichia urmitei. No Wolbachia were identified. These ă results show that R. bursa can be a carrier of Anaplasmataceae bacteria. ă (C) 2016 Elsevier GmbH. All rights reserved