Mange corrections
WHILE our sympathy goes out to G.L. Forrest (Readers’ Letters, February 2) for the problems his dog is suffering with mange, I feel we should correct a few points:
The writer appears to have been seriously misled by his or her vet, who says “a fox only has to urinate and your pet can get a dose of mange”. Like fleas and ticks, canine mange is an environmental parasite, and to suggest they can be passed on in urine is nonsense.
Neither is there any basis for assuming the disease was picked up from a fox, any more than it might have been from eggs hatched out on another dog, a hedgehog, squirrel or even tramped in on a shoe or car tyre.
Our wildlife hospital admits 650 to 700 foxes per year. Far from being “full of mange”, the small minority who do arrive with the disease are routinely and successfully treated within three weeks at a cost af less than £5.
They don’t have to undergo what G L Forrest describes as “weeks of visiting the vet and large bills”.
Perhaps the vet’s remarks were misunderstood. If not, I would recommend a second opinion and a little online research.
Trevor Williams
director
The Fox Project
Kent
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Comments
There are 2 comments to this article
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jakiB
Tuesday, March 6, 2012 at 02:57 PMWell done to the folks at Fox Project - I belong to the National Fox Welfare Society and I get really fed up with the fox always being put forward as being the bad guy. The foxes we get in the garden sometimes are a bit mangey but I give them treatment for it. We get a lot of pleasure out of watching them, especially when they bring the family in. It's as if they're telling their offspring 'this is a good safe place to visit'. My dogs are protected against mange mites by the use of Advocate which is a combined wormerflea treatment and I get it from my vet. We don't make a fuss about the foxes because there's really no need to. Live and let live!
brudie
Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 03:35 PMif you read the rspca.co.org site you see that dogs are very unlikely to catch mange from a fox. It would not get close enough. A qualified vet would not tell you that your dog could get it from its urine. If your dog was allowed to feed off a dead fox, or lick it in some way, then there is a possibilty of it being passed. But under normal situations, the dog would not catch mange from a fox.
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