btw, thanks for the civilized conversation, despite the difference of opinions. I hate for this place to be full of rules and be moderated for stuff other than spam.
Frogger was nice enough to email me to let me know who he was. He also brought up a point of our (my brother and myself) use of Panacur prophylactically many (six) years ago. Some may vaguely remember our use of the drug and our reasoning behind prophylactic use of it. But for those who do not, I'll go over it again. It is quite fair for 'frogger' to bring it up.
As with much science, meds are not a finite given. Some drugs are found to be less or more prone to good or adverse effects , given years of study. It has been found that Panacur may have slightly more adverse effects when given in large doses than was previously known. This is coming straight from Dr. Wright, the afore mentioned co-author of the book we keep mentioning. I do not believe he has up-dated this information in his book though. I'll start with this.
There are many examples of prophylactic treatment in dogs, cats, horses and such. These animals tend to live in a 'freer' , more open environment than our darts to. Open to reinfection time and time again. The neighbor cat comes over and infects my cat. A dog takes a crap on my lawn and infects my dog. You get the picture.
Well, about seven years ago there was not quite the same amount of documented information on exactly how certain dart parasites were passed along. There still is not tons, but it is better understood. Parasites can come in on plants, leaf litter, other frogs, hands, water, many, many other ways also.
Without the understanding of exactly how the parasites were getting into captive vivs , and after running many fecals on other froggers' darts we agreed that it may be prudent to prophylactically treat our dart collection with Panacur on a regular basis. If I remember correctly initially once a week, followed by once a month. For about a year or so.
Now, it should be said that this was only an option to us because we knew the state of health of our frogs before placing them in-viv. This is essential. We knew we had clean frogs going in , and knew that if we later tested and found the frogs to be infected there were parasites being introduced by methods not thought of. We tested ahead of time and treated for whatever was needed before putting them in-viv. The health was known in advance. If a frog happened to die (and with hundreds of frogs in one collection, a frog will die every now and then) we necropsied it immediately to understand why it died. There was no Panacur related deaths.
What we also found was that there were no new parasites infecting our frogs during or after our stopping the prophylactic use of the Panacur. Controls were used and we found that parasites were not present in either groups, panacur or control.
So, to sum it up. We , at one time six years ago, conducted a somewhat scientific experiment to find what the effects of cleanPanacur prophylactically treated frogs were vs. a control of clean non-panacur treated frogs and we found the result to be the same. Still clean frogs with no unknown deaths in either group. The deduction? Stop using something not needed with possible side effects down the road, costing us more time and money than needed.
The key being that we knew what we had going into the experiment (clean, healthy frogs), and knew what we had coming out (clean, healthy frogs). There was never a time when we had to guess at the health of our frogs. Before during or after. Years and many, many froglets after.
A dog being constantly reinfected, or with the possibility of being infected is a different matter than a frog in a closed environment. I have yet to think of a situation, when proper husbandry is used, that a frog will be constantly reinfected if it is placed into a 'clean' viv, and started out in 'clean ' health. In that situation there is no need for prophylactics. In my opinion.
He also brought up a point of our (my brother and myself) use of Panacur prophylactically many (six) years ago
Thanks for clarifying this. I remember the debates on DB, but then fell off the wagon a bit and had 2 kids and learned that we now call pumilios Oophaga I was under the impression that you guys were still recommending profilactically the use of fenbendazole. Good to know.
I'm curious to know what your and your brother's opinions are on the otherwise healthy looking, eating and breeding frogs, that at some point may have gone through a treatment with Panacur and year(s) later show some bacteria, spores, nematodes, etc in the fecals. Not a heavy parasite burden, but just presence (not a sterile fecal) There's a bit of debate that presence of intestinal flora in many animals is beneficial and causes no ill effects.
Thanks for clarifying this. I remember the debates on DB, but then fell off the wagon a bit and had 2 kids and learned that we now call pumilios Oophaga I was under the impression that you guys were still recommending profilactically the use of fenbendazole. Good to know.
As mentioned, prophylactically treating with Panacur is relatively safe , if done in a measured and regulated manor. It is just (now that we have completed testing on a large number of frogs, over a decent amount of time) that there are much better ways of getting your frogs clean and keeping them that way. Test, start clean, remain clean. Also as mentioned , there was a large, large number of early (in our careers) cases of captive bred parasites showing up in fecals sent to my brother. Also large amounts of parasites to be found in "very, very, reputable " breeders' frogs from whom we purchased. This confounded us a bit and we decided that the risk was low and decided to treat and test . To find that if we start clean, treating prophylactically or not, we end clean. It would seem that practise we have been preaching about for the last seven years or so such as absolute need to quarantine and test while doing so have now become more of a common practise. Where as the needle in my eye, bane of my existence, kick in the crotch, statement "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" has now become something of a laughing point and it is understood by many more that you really can't tell by simply looking at your frogs, or keeping them alive for a couple years and producing a few offspring that they are not "broken". Take a good hard look at Magic Johnson. Does he "look" broke ? Would anyone care to get a blood transfusion from him now?
Things change. Things become better understood. This especially happens after years and years of fecal exams, necropsies, dozens and dozens of different species from many different countries and many different breeders, ect., ect.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Marty
I'm curious to know what your and your brother's opinions are on the otherwise healthy looking, eating and breeding frogs, that at some point may have gone through a treatment with Panacur and year(s) later show some bacteria, spores, nematodes, etc in the fecals. Not a heavy parasite burden, but just presence (not a sterile fecal) There's a bit of debate that presence of intestinal flora in many animals is beneficial and causes no ill effects.
I'll start by saying that in the amount and proper procedures administered by most vets, it is very difficult to treat a dart with Panacur and see any adverse effects down the line. This comes from the testing and the use of Pancur for periods quite possibly longer than found to be necessary. Read, the non Panacur treated/tested frogs had the same amount of parasites as the treated frogs, none. I have had tons of frogs treated prophylactically and otherwise and had zero negative effect. It would have shown by now. I'd have to guess.
The fact that you have frogs that had been treated with panacur has nothing to do with the fact that they now show parasites and other possibly negative infections in their fecals. They are non-related issues.
As to the possibility of 'beneficial parasites"...I have hit my head against the wall with a couple/few very intelligent froggers over the years about this one. Here is my stance. If anyone, at any time , finds something in the gut, fecal exam, or any other form of reliable testing to show that a protozoa, worm, bacteria, fungus, or whatever is helpful to darts, by simple definition it is not a parasite. Parasites do absolutely nothing beneficial for the host at all. Period. Is it possible that there are creatures living in darts that are beneficial or at least symbiotic? Absolutely. Have they been found as of yet? Not one single one , yet. Some may point out that pinworms have been known to help certain other animals, and we all know we ourselves have tons of beneficial bacteria and the like living in us. But the fact of the matter is that nobody, not a single scientist out there, has yet to find a single creature living in our darts that is known to have beneficial properties. Not one.
In short. Lots of different animals have lots of different thing crawling, swimming, and floating around them that may be helping out. Many of those things will kill other animals. It may or may not be known, I have not brought this up in awhile, as the are becoming fewer people arguing this fact with me, but coccidia , which can be controlled by many animals out there by their immune systems (including many herps) can not be controlled by darts' immune system. In other words, if a bad strain of coccidia enters the darts' system it could be fatal to them , where as in other animals it is not such a big deal. Coccidia is in curable in darts. Treatable after detection through testing, but incurrable, like herpes.
I'd get the mentioned frog tested again , and decide if it needs meds or not.
Show me a beneficial dart parasite and I take it off the parasite list.
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