PORTLAND, OR (KPTV) –It was a close call for some local dog owners.
Just moments before they were going to have their paralyzed dog put down, someone discovered a tick in the dog’s neck.
17 Comments on Oregon: Ollie the Collie saved by sharp-eyed vet intern
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The whole situation could have been avoided if the dumbass owner had treated Ollie for ticks and fleas monthly. We treat our dogs around the first of the month, religiously, and have never spotted ticks or fleas- and we live in the South.
I have found that if you remove ticks from your dog yourself, the dog will tell you where they are. If you stroke the dog slowly, it will turn it’s head and look at you when your hand is near a tick.
The tick treatment on dogs can be very hard on their organs. Can even kill them.
I had never lived in tick country before and those are some disgusting creatures. I use (sparingly, cuz it stinks for a couple of days) wondercide which is a natural remedy made from cedar oil. The best solution though is to brush let a bit when they come inside because it takes ticks a while to burrow into the hide. Brushing the dog makes them very happy and is actually kind of cathartic to me. Wondercide also kills fleas on contact, but fleas aren’t a huge problem here, and wondcide, you owe me a royalty check!…
Lucky Ollie, collies are my favorite dogs. Blame it on Lassie and my collie for 12 years Buddy. I love golden retrievers and yellow labs but collies more, they’re great family dogs. I will have at least one more male collie before I get too old to have another dog. Going to name him Kirby.
Bajeebus, I’m sorry, but the spell check killed me and the edit feature doesn’t seem to work for me yet, as I am a little slow to the draw…
Jack Daniels works well on a fresh tick. A cotton ball dripping wet placed on the tick will usually cause it to back out. It has the added bonus of disinfecting the bite.
Another good reason to always have a bottle of Tennessee whiskey on hand.
Yeah…………we have a leach onus in America!! ……………It’s called a barck!!!
4arepublic knows.
[I know this is long, but someone might appreciate the help]
As a professional in this field, nothing beats preventative maintenance.
It’s either that or a whole bunch of the same treatment when needed plus the suffering all the mammals will go through until they are gone.
Funny thing about fleas, their life cycle is not complicated but most people have no idea what’s really going on. There are more than a few factors to consider and control, but add to that all the misunderstanding of what’s really going on that a lot of people have and it can be frustrating for all.
I made a 4 panel tutorial for my clients so I don’t have to keep explaining over and over that a re-treatment within a month of the first one is useless.
When fighting them, you do want to do a thorough treatment of any environment that has them – but that is not what solves the problem. That’s just one part of a total approach. You could actually skip it but it would add a couple of weeks, at least, to the process.
If you think a treatment of the home and yard should result in no fleas by the next day – then you know zilch about what’s really going on.
You ALWAYS have to go through all the pupae hatching after that first treatment. No chemical touches them in that cocoon. Depending on the temperature, it could take from 21 days to a few months to be clear of them. If you did a treatment and you had no fleas at all after that day – then you didn’t have any eggs fall in your home in the first place and you caught the problem before it got out of hand.
The real key is having control over ALL animals on the property. If you have visiting animals on your property (stray cat? raccoon? skunk? rat? squirrel? etc)that you aren’t making a death zone for fleas, you’re going to keep having them.
Ever since I found a bulk supply of Nitenpyrum my job has become easier with misguided clients. While it only kills whatever bites it for one day – no flea born that day or before will see the next day. The next day you will have more hatchings and another dose of Nitenpyrum does the trick. 100%
You just have to keep it up until they are gone. It’s MUCH less chemical exposure for your pet than any flea bath, shampoo or dip. Much cheaper and easier too.
JohnS, your comment made me laugh and remember an episode I had with a tick. It was a wood tick that embedded itself in the back of my knee. I freaked. I was new to tick country and never dealt with something that you couldn’t kill by squeezing it in a kleenex.
I had heard that putting vaseline on it will make it back out (never heard the Jack Daniels one). Well, I didn’t have vaseline, but I did have Vicks Vaporub. I put that on and it splayed out it’s legs and died before it could back out! I was still freaking when I pulled it out and thankfully the head came with it.
None of my kitties ever went outside (except on my screened-in balcony) so they never got fleas or ticks. But, me…well I stopped walking through the tall grass meadows that day!
Whenever we take the fifth wheel south with the dogs, our first stop is Walmart for whatever I forgot to pack, and Frontline for the pooches which is over the counter there. I love my vet but we don’t treat year round.
On a side note, everything you need to know about animals can be learned from watching All Creatures Great and Small on Amazon streaming. My dad was a vet and James Herriot was like a rock star in the 70s.
Dadof4
Just how does one control fleas in a yard environment?
Squirrels, raccoons, possums, moles, voles, deer, cats and the occasional rare visitor all find occasion to enter even fenced yards.
Spraying the property every day to kill the live fleas is not realistic.
I have found the light bulb glue traps at eating and sleeping areas, along with regular (weekly during flea season) bathing using Dawn dishwashing soap to be very effective. I also built a grade level water feature in the yard with a heat lamp hidden behind the waterfall. A lot of fleas die in that thing, they end up clogging the filter.
JohnS,
You should never spray the environment daily. That’s what I was referring to when I said it was a waste of time. More important than the waste is you are putting chemical way over the limit the label instructs.
One treatment for the yard. Once a month is enough.
Yes, fleas will keep hatching until all the pupae are done, but the cycle has been broken and no more pupae are being produced. You just have to get through this period without producing more flea eggs on the hosts. That’s the big hole people leave if they leave a hole in the plan.
How to get through:
Easiest way, bar-none: Do not let the animal back in that area for a month or so. My neighbor refuses to go through a whole program and keep at it.
One year my dog got some from them in August 2012 and this is all I did –
The situation was that the house was free from fleas but her area had them. She was outside more often than not at the time.
One power spray of her sleeping area and the part of the yard around it and to the areas she ran. I did not spray areas she did not spend time in.
One flea bath.
The most important and effective step – I removed her from the infested area and made her an inside dog for over a month – I never let her in the backyard until they were gone. Front walks only.
Seriously, as far as the dog was concerned, she was done with fleas that day. As long as I didn’t let her in the backyard during the final hatchings.
This next part is not necessary but it did help in a couple of ways.
Daily, at sunset, I put a desk lamp by her sleeping area outside and had it shine down on a glue board. Every morning I would go pick it up but waited `til sunset to set up the lamp and glue board again.
I was catching 150 fleas a day for the first 9 days. Then it started dropping. Every 3 days it would drop by half after then. By day 23 I had no fleas. It was August. The warmer it is the faster their growth cycle. Meaning, if you do this in cool weather it will likely take longer.
They would have died even without the glue boards – that was just to monitor the progress and see if it did go down as time passed.
That confusing part is that while the eggs and larvae will be handled by the chemical – because they crawl on that treated surface and die – the pupae are still hatching and they spend NO or extremely little time on that treated surface.
They achieve adulthood but don’t hatch out until vibration notifies them of a potential host walking by. Then it’s a quick jump or two and they are safe from the ground treatment. Unless the host is a death zone too.
Remember this one thing and it starts to make sense: Adult fleas do not survive out in the wild by themselves – they MUST have a blood meal within a few days or they will die. If you’re being jumped on by fleas anywhere, then you have just walked by an area that a flea infested animal has spent time. Probably frequently if the problem is bad. They are not hopping around out there having a life and waiting for a host – well they MAY be, but only for a few days, tops, if there are no hosts available.
Understanding that info alone can open up your understanding of what’s really going on.
Short instructions:
Spray the yard properly according to the label.
The label is the law for applying chemicals professionally. Don’t over do it because you think it’s not working. It is. You’re just going through the hatchings of those impenetrable pupa cases.
Treat the animals.
If you can remove then from the infested area then you only have to do it once. If you can’t then you need to make them a death zone for fleas – they will be killing the new hatchings instead of that glue board. This is the part most people fail at. They think it’s just the environment that needs treating – SO IT MUST NEED MORE!! Wrong.
Fact: Fleas are attracted to light.
A. You can find them on window sill trying to get out of a just emptied home.
B. Light based traps will catch them all if no animals are around.
C. A black dog and a white dog can walk through an infested area at the same time and the white dog will have more fleas on it than the black one.
Their eyesight is rudimentary so motion and light get their attention the best.
This subject is the one I speak about most often when asked to give a talk to a group. I think it is one of the most misunderstood problems of all I do.
Did I answer your question, JohnS? It’s there to absorb. It’s simple once you understand it. lol
Basically, get your pet out of the infested area, treat it, then wait. No shortcuts other than putting a few inches of top soil or re-sodding over the area.
As for the other animals – you have to get rid of them if they are camping out on your property. Period. Trap them if you must. No get rid of them? No get rid of fleas.
I have given the city 8 or 9 cats over the past few years. They were hanging out both in my back & front yards. I have a very cool and shady property compared to most houses here. My neighbor knows I catch them. He can go get them, but he won’t because he doesn’t really care about them. He just breeds more.
None go to a Vet. None have shots. None are fixed. Many have disappeared. 😎
The occasional visitor is not your enemy. Just the ones making it their home. Where they sleep will be flea central.
You can have an egg or two drop from a visitor but giving your pet a monthly preventative treatment will stop that from developing.
Thanks dadof4. However, I can’t trap the animals here, especially the neighborhood cats. During flea season the squirrels spend all day kicking off fleas, it is not uncommon to see them with their cheeks and necks raw and bleeding during flea season. Possums, squirrels, and roof rats all sleep in the trees, and with the exception of the roof rats it is illegal to molest or trap them. (CA is a grand place)
A monthly spray will still help you.
Light-based traps will too. Glue or soapy water as the catcher. Soap allows water to stay on the oily insect bodies and cover their breathing holes – they suffocate quickly. That’s why Dawn dish soap & water in a spray bottle will kill wasps so quickly. Dawn has two surfactants (de-greasers) in it. I use it a lot.
Clogging a filter is extreme. It’s hard to imagine it’s that bad. It would have to be on the level of an untreated dog kennel for years to get that bad. Hairless animals at that point. I have to assume a lot of other insects are attracted to the light also.
As for CA law getting in the way –
Sometimes animals disappear. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Where’d they go? I don’t know! Not my animals.
Do your work out of public view. Most people would freak at what I have to do and that’s just with the legal means.
P.R. matters and when I do bird work, it is real sensitive like that. It will cause a news station to come out if a whole flock drops dead in one day.
Legal, but bad P.R. So I do my work in bits and pieces so no one is the wiser. I could wipe them out in less than a week, but if it’s a large flock it may take months to do it “under the radar”.
Same thing when I catch a neighbor’s almost-feral cats that won’t stay off the property. I just handle it. Lucky for me shooting them is not necessary and the city comes to empty my traps and they are offered for adoption.
The least invasive thing I can think of is to feed them and treat the food with Nitenpyram daily for a month or so. It’s possible.
It only takes a few miligrams per squirrel and I found a source where you can get over 570 miligrams for @ $70. Delivered. Ebay. Just search the chemical name and look for someone selling 100 capsules of 57 milligrams ea.
Here’s one seller: http://www.ebay.com/itm/100-Capsules-5FREE-Generic-Capstar-Nitenpyram-flea-control-57mg-Dogs-25-125-lbs-/182125546134?hash=item2a67874a96:g:GI0AAOSwubRXMp9d
Sprinkle some every day on some shelled sunflower seeds and they’ll start having less fleas. Rats love sunflower seeds too. I call it rat/squirrel crack. They like it more than pecans. If you have a lot of rats, you should do something about that. I’m sure CA doesn’t mind you killing them. Eliminating their safe spaces is key too, whether it’s your house, barn, shed or a patio furniture, it needs rat proofing – after you’ve killed them.
For ‘coons and other animals like that you could set out dry cat food and sprinkle the Nitenpyram on it. It’s what I do for my cats. I just shove a whole capsule to the back of the dog’s mouths. They’re easy.
Personally, for squirrels, I would break out my pellet rifle and thin the herd. Rifle, chair, beer, friends. It’s a party!
But I live in Texas where you can kill a squirrel if it is damaging your property – even in the city. You just can’t shoot them for fun or dinner inside Dallas city limits.
Make that 5700 miligrams total for that price.
Not good to make math mistakes in my biz. sheesh.