BYC Café

[microchick]

I try to eat healthy but I'm at an age where I need all the preservatives that I can get, LOL.

Hi everyone. Wanted to stop by and thank everyone for all the well wishes and condolences.

Life is slowly getting back to the new normal for us. We miss Sid but we are adjusting and so are her remaining siblings, three brothers and one sister. Thank God they are all so far healthy without symptoms of the Pythiosis that killed her.

I don't know if I posted it here but the doctor who took care of her called us and it definitely was what they suspected. She assured us that we made the right decision to set her soul free because they couldn't save her and she was dying. Her bowel was obstructed in multiple places and the disease had moved into her stomach and large bowel. On top of that she had pancreatitis and peritonitis as well as a perforation in her intestine. The parasite had also caused cancer like masses to form in her mesentery.

We still don't know how she contracted this horrible disease. We have our suspicions and with that thought in mind we are filling in the lagoon in their big fenced in back yard that had been their swimming pool for two years.

This has left us suspicious of every puddle of water we see along with our two ponds. Even though we don't allow them access to the ponds we still look at them and shake our heads.

Our goal is to spread the word about Pythiosis and we tell everyone we know here that have dogs to visit www.pythiosis.com and read up about this killer of dogs.

Gulf state areas are the most prevalent when it comes to infestations but this has moved as far north as Missouri, and Illinois in the Midwest. Not only does it infect dogs but the skin form of the disease can also infect cats and horses.

Be aware and do what you can to protect the animals you love. And yes, yourself as humans can be infected with the cutaneious type the same as cats, dogs and horses.

In Sidney's Memory. Spread the word, please.

 

[ronott1]

I try to eat healthy but I'm at an age where I need all the preservatives that I can get, LOL.

Hi everyone. Wanted to stop by and thank everyone for all the well wishes and condolences.

Life is slowly getting back to the new normal for us. We miss Sid but we are adjusting and so are her remaining siblings, three brothers and one sister. Thank God they are all so far healthy without symptoms of the Pythiosis that killed her.

I don't know if I posted it here but the doctor who took care of her called us and it definitely was what they suspected. She assured us that we made the right decision to set her soul free because they couldn't save her and she was dying. Her bowel was obstructed in multiple places and the disease had moved into her stomach and large bowel. On top of that she had pancreatitis and peritonitis as well as a perforation in her intestine. The parasite had also caused cancer like masses to form in her mesentery.

We still don't know how she contracted this horrible disease. We have our suspicions and with that thought in mind we are filling in the lagoon in their big fenced in back yard that had been their swimming pool for two years.

This has left us suspicious of every puddle of water we see along with our two ponds. Even though we don't allow them access to the ponds we still look at them and shake our heads.

Our goal is to spread the word about Pythiosis and we tell everyone we know here that have dogs to visit www.pythiosis.com and read up about this killer of dogs.

Gulf state areas are the most prevalent when it comes to infestations but this has moved as far north as Missouri, and Illinois in the Midwest. Not only does it infect dogs but the skin form of the disease can also infect cats and horses.

Be aware and do what you can to protect the animals you love. And yes, yourself as humans can be infected with the cutaneious type the same as cats, dogs and horses.

In Sidney's Memory. Spread the word, please.

I did read that oldsters need more protein.

It is nice to see the effort to get the word out about pythiosis!

 

[microchick]

Thanks, Ron. It's all we can do at this point and worth it if saves another life.

 

[DobieLover]

Thanks, Ron. It's all we can do at this point and worth it if saves another life.

I agree! When I read your story, I researched it. I don't think we have a high risk of it up here but I keep the dogs away from stagnant water of all sorts as much as possible. I've also been minimizing their access to the creek although that should be safe.

Maybe you could start a thread. Or do a search on the "show me your dogs" threads and post there. Or both!

 

[ronott1]

I agree! When I read your story, I researched it. I don't think we have a high risk of it up here but I keep the dogs away from stagnant water of all sorts as much as possible. I've also been minimizing their access to the creek although that should be safe.

Maybe you could start a thread. Or do a search on the "show me your dogs" threads and post there. Or both!

Here in the summer, we get toxic algae in some ponds and lakes. Animals and people need to stay out of the water then!

 

[microchick]

I agree! When I read your story, I researched it. I don't think we have a high risk of it up here but I keep the dogs away from stagnant water of all sorts as much as possible. I've also been minimizing their access to the creek although that should be safe.

Maybe you could start a thread. Or do a search on the "show me your dogs" threads and post there. Or both!

I did just that Dobie. I started a thread in the 'other pets' section called In Memory of Sidney-Spread the Word.

I was just talking to my husband and told him that this is such a new and emerging disease that I am tempted to make up a flier and attach Sid's necropsy report to it and mail it out to all of the local vets. Most that I've read about it is that the majority of vets, unless they have dealt with a case of Pythiosis, have not heard about it up here. I wonder if that is true of the gulf states also or just the central Midwest.

 

[Meg-in-MT]

Here in the summer, we get toxic algae in some ponds and lakes. Animals and people need to stay out of the water then!

We get a type of it here, as well. Blue algae.

 

[microchick]

The problem here is that just about every pond around us is used for a swimming hole by kids and sometimes adults and it's standing water that is the most at risk.

I haven't read anything about running water in streams being a problem.

Our ponds get a green algae bloom a couple of times during the summer months. I've never heard of it being toxic but then.....I don't have any desire to even wade in it when it is like that even if I did wade in it.

Friends have often asked me why we don't swim in our pond and I tell them because it's infested with snapping turtles and I value my toes. Same reason I don't have ducks!

 

[Grandmas Coop]

I try to eat healthy but I'm at an age where I need all the preservatives that I can get, LOL.

Hi everyone. Wanted to stop by and thank everyone for all the well wishes and condolences.

Life is slowly getting back to the new normal for us. We miss Sid but we are adjusting and so are her remaining siblings, three brothers and one sister. Thank God they are all so far healthy without symptoms of the Pythiosis that killed her.

I don't know if I posted it here but the doctor who took care of her called us and it definitely was what they suspected. She assured us that we made the right decision to set her soul free because they couldn't save her and she was dying. Her bowel was obstructed in multiple places and the disease had moved into her stomach and large bowel. On top of that she had pancreatitis and peritonitis as well as a perforation in her intestine. The parasite had also caused cancer like masses to form in her mesentery.

We still don't know how she contracted this horrible disease. We have our suspicions and with that thought in mind we are filling in the lagoon in their big fenced in back yard that had been their swimming pool for two years.

This has left us suspicious of every puddle of water we see along with our two ponds. Even though we don't allow them access to the ponds we still look at them and shake our heads.

Our goal is to spread the word about Pythiosis and we tell everyone we know here that have dogs to visit www.pythiosis.com and read up about this killer of dogs.

Gulf state areas are the most prevalent when it comes to infestations but this has moved as far north as Missouri, and Illinois in the Midwest. Not only does it infect dogs but the skin form of the disease can also infect cats and horses.

Be aware and do what you can to protect the animals you love. And yes, yourself as humans can be infected with the cutaneious type the same as cats, dogs and horses.

In Sidney's Memory. Spread the word, please.

What a horrible this you all went through, I am so sorry!

 

[Grandmas Coop]

We get a type of it here, as well. Blue algae.

YES, I was just reading the page and was thinking the same thing, there is a lake over in /by Port Townsend that a womans dog got in the water and died the next day, Algae Bloom