Distemper

It was a bit of a sad and stressful day around my house . The little skunk that I saw yesterday came back and he was definitely in worse shape. He was staggering and disoriented, and was showing the symptoms of advanced distemper. I carefully approached the skunk and was able to get the dog cage over it. I called the Sarnia Animal control, who sent me to someone else, who sent me to someone else, who again sent me to someone else. In the end I could not find one animal welfare agency that would come out and take care of the poor fella. The last person I talked to said to shot it.

I did a lot of research on distemper the afternoon and learned a few interesting thing.

• Distemper is passed through bodily fluids - saliva, eye discharge, urine, feces, and even skunk spray
• There are two completely different types of distemper - canine and feline. Cats cannot catch canine distemper and dogs cannot catch feline distemper: however. animals like skunks, coons and ferrets can catch both.
• Humans cannot catch distemper
• Distemper is more prevalent in young animals
• The distemper virus cannot live outside the host for long and can be killed with heat, sun and disinfectant cleaning products - bleach
• The symptoms of distemper are very similar to rabies.
• In adult domestic dogs there is a 50% mortality rate from distemper
• There is no cure for distemper; however, there are numerous herbal remedies to help the dog's immunity system fight off the disease
• Vitamin A and C help to fight distemper

Unfortunately, in the end the poor skunk had to be killed. So sad.