Canine Distemper outbreak Kasane January 2010
Distemper outbreak in Kasane. Over 100 dogs died . Laura and I vaccinated over 650 dogs on our own and with our own finances preventing the spread into the predators in the national park. Apart from the severe suffering of dogs that died the carcasses were being thrown into the bush were hyenas would eat then and then get infected. They would then arrive at a lion kill and potentially infect them.
We live so close with wildlife in Kasane it was a real threat. Susceptible species are Lion, Cape (painted) Wild Dog, Hyena, leopards, bat eared foxes and leopards. No funding could be procured and no one wanted to listen to reason, so I spent over P70 000.00 out of pocket expense hard costs ,not to consider our time and effort. The epidemic was stopped a few weeks after last vaccination. Dogs were wormed, immunized with a 6 way vaccine including Distemper and Parvo Virus plus Rabies. The health of the local dog population increased tremendously.
I’m sure some predators were infected and died but there was no way to confirm this. We sleep with clear conciseness at night as a major disaster was adverted.
Distemper outbreak in Kasane. Over 100 dogs died . Laura and I vaccinated over 650 dogs on our own and with our own finances preventing the spread into the predators in the national park. Apart from the severe suffering of dogs that died the carcasses were being thrown into the bush were hyenas would eat then and then get infected. They would then arrive at a lion kill and potentially infect them.
We live so close with wildlife in Kasane it was a real threat. Susceptible species are Lion, Cape (painted) Wild Dog, Hyena, leopards, bat eared foxes and leopards. No funding could be procured and no one wanted to listen to reason, so I spent over P70 000.00 out of pocket expense hard costs ,not to consider our time and effort. The epidemic was stopped a few weeks after last vaccination. Dogs were wormed, immunized with a 6 way vaccine including Distemper and Parvo Virus plus Rabies. The health of the local dog population increased tremendously.
I’m sure some predators were infected and died but there was no way to confirm this. We sleep with clear conciseness at night as a major disaster was adverted.
