Worms, Fleas and Ticks !

Lovely heading you might say !
But what a minefield it all is.

Tika arrived with us at 7.5 weeks old having had some worm treatmentsat 2, 3, 4, 5 and 7 weeks as a puppy. At that time you have to then worm them monthly.
So I followed the vets directions after that and took her to be weighed and then she was given worm tablets or skin spot on treatment every month.
Then it all started to get a bit complicated !

There isnt one treatment which will tackle all the types of worms along with Fleas and Ticks. So as we now move towards spring and summer these start to become a problem. Apparently ticks will only begin to appear after the last frost disappears. I suspect we still have some more frost to come here in Scotland so I hope not to have to worry about that yet. However we definitely go places in the summer in Scotland where there are ticks and also where there is lyme disease in the ticks so I am definitely wanting to avoid those if possible.

Another risk which I know Tika will be exposed to in the summer is slugs and snails. She already ate some of the ones which were lying around in our garden in the autumn and it will be difficult to clear them from the garden so I need to make sure she is protected from lungworms which can be found in slugs and snails but also in any water they may have drunk from or dog toys etc that they may have crawled over in the night.

Anyway here is a quick summary of the types of treatment she will now be taking at age 6 months :

Monthly - Advocate on skin on back of neck - this deals with lungworm, fleas and worms. - she will get this this evening - 15th March
In two weeks we will give her Milbemax which will last 3 months and deals with a broad spectrum of worms - roundworms, hookworm, whipworm, tapeworm, heartworm (apparently the only thing we are double dosing against with these two treatments is roundworms.) The two treatments need to be taken two weeks apart at they both contain something collies may react against and its in case of overdose (I think !)

This treatment should take us to mid June.
At this point we will be spending quite a bit of the summer camping or walking moorland so ticks will become a problem and they are also worse later in the summer when its wet apparenlty.
So in Mid June we will give her Frontline as a spot on which is effective against ticks and the next Milbemax tablet for the broadspectrum of worms.

PHEW !!

And watch out - one thing I have found out is that collies and related dogs have a problem in their brains with processing some chemical which is in Milbemax and there is also a warning on the lable of Advocate to be very careful that collies dont manage to lick the Advocate as it affects that type of dog so you need to be very careful when applying it.  And with the Milbemax you must be very careful to give the right dose and not overdose as the problem arises if you were to give a dose of 5x the recommeneded.  Its just as well collie owners are as clever as their dogs or we just couldnt cope with all this !

Hope you find this useful and please send any comments which you think can add to the discussion and help us all understand this a bit better.

For more information about worms : http://www.wormfree.co.uk/dog_cat_worms/en/index.shtml
http://www.ashwoodvet.co.uk/news/view-article.php?Title=SLUGS+AND+SNAILS+and+DOGS+!!!+-+A+VERY+BAD+MIX+!

Ticks already spotted in Scotland in March 2011 ! http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-highlands-islands-12804689

Advantix website : http://www.animalhealth.bayerhealthcare.com/5614.0.html

European ticks now found in some areas of the UK : http://news.bbc.co.uk/earth/hi/earth_news/newsid_9432000/9432605.stm

Some very detailed information including about diseases that can be caught in Europe or abroad : http://www.cvbd.org/

Here is information about lungworm - it is very good and easy to read information and the good news is it seems that lungworm is treatable. http://www.lungworm.co.uk/scripts/pages/en/home.php

More confusing updates from vets (18 May) - apparently the Milbemax 3 month does doesnt work after a while against lungworm - we would need to give her the monthly version for that and that is off license ! (but this conflicts with what I have already written ...someone is not telling me the right story -......aaarghh !)

Winter Greetings !

No idea why this picture is sideways - does anyone know how to fix this in the blog ? Thanks !

Here is a picture of Tika with her "friend to be" - my friend's labrador puppy - 9 days younger. Not sure how they are going to get along yet - possibly signs they might or might not. It would be easier if they could just get along as that would be good for walks once they are a bit older. Anyway her friend decided to follow Tika's fashion sense and got the same very trendy tartan coat ! Essential for minus ten degree temperatures !

For Christmas entertainment, we got her a Jibber Jabber toy from the pet shop ! That kept her busy most of the day. It is a ball which sort of jumps around and responds to their movement - if they throw it through the air it starts jibbering again ! Anyway she wasnt remotely frightened or wary of it as I thought she might have been. But it did provide a lot of fun for her ! Unfortunately just like kids toys, the batteries had run out by the end of the day !

Other news is that she is now toilet trained - yippee !! Mind you we have left no mats of rugs down just in case ! I will eventually risk bringing out the fleece throw I bought from Ikea to protect our chairs but I think its early days yet - I dont want her associating any of these things with "toilet" !!

And today as she hit 16 weeks old we got the parvovirus booster at the vets and also the kennel cough vaccine which she needs for the puppy classes we are going to go along to next week.  So that was more money to the vet - expensive business !  The vet also recommended that depending on her lifestyle we may need to keep worming her every month, but it doesnt always need to be the tablets, sometimes we can use the "spot on" skin version. She now weighs 9.9 kg and when they hit 10 kg they can get adult worm tablets which are larger. I liked the puppy version ones as they went down really easily. However I must admit she seems very calm at the vets and doesnt appear to even notice her injections so thats good news !

Oh yes and the other good news is its finally thawing so we can now see some grass, although there's still lots of ice around...

Vets for Worm Tablets

Age 14 weeks - now weighs 8.95 kg !
She was 4.2 kg at 8 weeks !

She got weighed at the vets and they then gaves us two worm tablets as puppies need to be wormed every month until 6 months and then 6 monthly after that. They were pretty small and went down quite easily with a chocolate drop. However she may be more wary next time now that she knows what I am up to !!

Anyway must dash - I can hear her wrecking stuff !