# Every Dog Died



## Lee H Sternberg (Jan 27, 2008)

I just heard the tiny coastal town I will be retiring to in Costa Rica has no dogs left alive. They all died 1 by 1 over a 2 month period. I'm talking about maybe 30 dogs.

What kind of medical epidemic do you think might have caused this?

I'm very familiar with the lack of care most natives provide for their dogs but I know at least some were vaccinated. In fact my my inlaws dogs were vaccinated.

Because some were vaccinated possibly poison was involved. 

Dogs typically run loose and unsupervised there.

Unbelievably, no one took their dogs to a vet to determine the cause of death. That's the mentality in C.R.


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## Lee H Sternberg (Jan 27, 2008)

I should add the average person doesn't own a car to transport a dog to the nearest vet 30 miles away.


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## Connie Sutherland (Mar 27, 2006)

Lee H Sternberg said:


> I just heard the tiny coastal town I will be retiring to in Costa Rica has no dogs left alive. They all died 1 by 1 over a 2 month period. I'm talking about maybe 30 dogs.
> 
> What kind of medical epidemic do you think might have caused this?
> 
> ...


Questions:

Vaccinated against what, though?

Poisoning dogs who lived indoors too? Every dog was running loose?

There was a canine 'flu epidemic of 2005 that started with racing greyhounds but entered the companion dog population in Florida, but as bad as it was, the mortality rate was still around 10%, as I recall.

What was the manner of death? Say, of your in-laws' dogs?


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## Tracy Studer (Jan 31, 2008)

Do they have "Blue-Green Algae" there?


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## Lee H Sternberg (Jan 27, 2008)

Connie Sutherland said:


> Questions:
> 
> Vaccinated against what, though?
> 
> ...


They have all the same issues we have here like parvo and distemper. The dogs get the same vaccines that ours do.

There isn't any such thing as a house dog there. They all roam freely. There aren't any fenced yards.The outside doors are always open and people spend most of their time on the patios because of the heat. Inside is mostly for sleeping, cooking and sometimes eating. Most people don't even allow dogs in the house.

I understand it sounds weird. But it's a different way of life and culture in the small Costa Rican towns. Get this, bars on your windows are status symbols. It means you have something inside worth stealing.

I will find out exactly how the inlaws dogs died.


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## Lee H Sternberg (Jan 27, 2008)

Tracy Studer said:


> Do they have "Blue-Green Algae" there?


I can't answer that question. Is that in the ocean or on land. I know most dogs don't swim in the ocean.


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## Lee H Sternberg (Jan 27, 2008)

My main concern is my dogs will be with me when I retire there. I will fence the yard and have kennels. They will be house dogs. 

I plan on speaking to a local vet there to find out if it is some strange disease that we don't know about here and if there is a vaccine for it.

If it was poison I can control that because my dogs will only be outside the fence when they are with me.


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## Tracy Studer (Jan 31, 2008)

Lee H Sternberg said:


> I can't answer that question. Is that in the ocean or on land. I know most dogs don't swim in the ocean.


 
It is in/on water. Here is some info about it. This is from the Washington Dept of Ecology, but it does say that it is present all over the world.
http://www.ecy.wa.gov/programs/wq/plants/algae/publichealth/GeneralCyanobacteria.html

Though it does seem to me that if it was someting like this that killed the dogs, it would have happened a long time ago. Unless it (the algae) was somehow just introduced to the area recently.

This is what I found on another site about what happens if they drink it.

"If animals ingest the toxin, they can be quickly paralyzed and die. Signs of poisoning include weakness, staggering, difficulty breathing, convulsions and death."


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## Chris McDonald (May 29, 2008)

I got to guess poisoning; I would like to think accidental whether it be the water or rat poison or something else. 
Maybe it was Chinese baby food


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## Lisa Preston (Aug 21, 2008)

What is the name of the town?


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## Lee H Sternberg (Jan 27, 2008)

Lisa Preston said:


> What is the name of the town?


The town is Villa Real just outside of Tamarindo, in Guanacaste Province, Costa Rica. I might add they ever experienced anything like this before.


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## Lee H Sternberg (Jan 27, 2008)

OK I got to the bottom of this dog death situation. The dogs that were not vaccinated died. The vaccinated dogs lived through whatever disease ran through the town. 

The inlaws older vaccinated dogs lived but the unvaccinated litter did not survive. The pups in the litter were almost 3 months old.

A ****** in the town said it was distemper but who knows if he was knowledgeable enough to diagnose.


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## Connie Sutherland (Mar 27, 2006)

Lee H Sternberg said:


> OK I got to the bottom of this dog death situation. The dogs that were not vaccinated died. The vaccinated dogs lived through whatever disease ran through the town.
> 
> The inlaws older vaccinated dogs lived but the unvaccinated litter did not survive. The pups in the litter were almost 3 months old.
> 
> A ****** in the town said it was distemper but who knows if he was knowledgeable enough to diagnose.


If that's the overview, then distemper would be my guess. Parvo is relatively uncommon in adult dogs. Unless you are saying that only unvaccinated PUPPIES contracted it?


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## Lee H Sternberg (Jan 27, 2008)

Connie Sutherland said:


> If that's the overview, then distemper would be my guess. Parvo is relatively uncommon in adult dogs. Unless you are saying that only unvaccinated PUPPIES contracted it?


No Connie, it was ALL the dogs that were not vaccinated. That is most of the dogs in town. As I said dogs are usually not high value items in those areas. They are all muts and multiply like flies. Death rate from various diseases is high. An old dog is 3 or 4 years old if that.

This was the first time anyone in town could remember a almost total wipe out. My guess is maybe 1 or 2 other families besides my inlaws vaccinate their dogs. My inlaws didn't start vaccinating until I was able to guilt them into it. It took years plus I sent down a car so transportation became easier for them a few years ago.


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