Acute gastric dilatation in monkeys: a microbiologic study of gastric contents, blood and feed.

Twenty-one of 24 simian primates with acute gastric dilatation had Clostridium perfringens in their gastric contents. Only 2 of 18 normal animals contained this organism in their gastric contents. Clostridium perfringens was isolated from monkey biscuits taken from the cages of five affected animals and from five of 11 incoming lots of feed. After these biscuits were fed to normal animals, this organism could be isolated from the gastric contents. There were no other organisms isolated which could account for the voluminous gas production in this condition.