What the heck are these? Strongyles? Update

[JB]

@sparkygrace

Neither of us know if she will stay a low shedder.

exactly, which means there’s no point or value in a daily dewormer right now

@sparkygrace

The Power Pac worked quite well, making me believe there isn’t currently a resistance to that class of drug.

you treated the colony she brought with you. That’s not relevant to the colony of strongyles on your farm. That’s why I suggested, if another FEC is high enough, to try fenbendazole again and be sure to get a FECRT done 10-14 days later (not 4-6 weeks later as your vet suggested this time) in order to get a good idea on its effectiveness against the strongyles present on your farm.

@sparkygrace

The receptionist was wrong when I asked about ascarids; counts were zero on both tests.

Even more concerning that your vet recommended a PP if there were no ascarids.

I know you want to trust your vet, everyone does, but the deworming advice you’ve been given, at least as you’ve presented it, isn’t good advice, and isn’t even outside of the resistance issues.

Since there were no ascarids originally, it’s unlikely what you found came out of her.

[Ghazzu]

@sparkygrace

I took a parasitology class in college. It was right before lunch. I didn’t eat lunch for an entire semeste

My parasitology professor in vet school was a VMD/MD with a specialty in tropical medicine (human).
He’d always end his lectures (just before lunch) with some hideous zoonotic or human parasite, complete with slides. It only took us a few weeks to develop an immunity to the ick factor and resume eating a hearty lunch.

[sparkygrace]

Same. We saw a lovely photo of an African man sitting on a barrel; except it wasn’t a barrel. You probably know where I’m going. Photos of Leishmaniasis infections were fun too. We covered most tropical parasites. I also spent quite a bit of extra time studying tapeworms.

My senior research project was on Toxocara canis and visceral larval migrans. I spent a summer in a stifling hot lab running fecals on dog feces. Fun times.