CamelVet.com

steph · Joined: 11 Apr 2004 Posts: 2 Location: Australia

my 20+ year old female camel has in the past 24hrs been very wobbly on her feet, she seems to have excess saliva in her mouth and her appetite has decreased.
In the mornings she finds it difficult to get up and falls over constantly, towards the evenings she is slightly more stable. we had the local vet out and he thought she was just weak, we think its more then that and would really appreciate if you could give us some advice on what to do and what might be causing this.
She also seems depressed and her lip is drooping more then usual.
thank you

sonheim2 · Posted: Mon Apr 12, 2004 10:36 am Post subject: Sick Camel

Being that a vet checked her out and didn’t find anything, my thinking would be maybe she eat something poisons, what has she been eating, and does the color of her gums and inside the lips look normal?
I have forwarded this problem to a few others, most likely they will be asking a lot more questions. If you would like to leave your email address it would sure speed things up.

steph · Joined: 11 Apr 2004 Posts: 2 Location: Australia

my email is turicum@denmarkwa.net.au
she has been eating grape stems and also small amounts of grape skin after crushing, could it be possible that she has a yeast infection in her stomach and now everything is fermenting??
apart from that there has been nothing new given to her.
she has lost quite alot of weight also in the past month as her normal feed was drying up.

sonheim2

Below is a reply from Dr. Wright that I sent to Steph on 4-14-04

I think you might be right about the Australian camel. I would remove that camel from every bit of the feed or pasturage that it is presently on, even if there are other animals in it who seem normal. I would get some outside hay and feed that to the camel exclusively for a while. I would even get some outside water. I would also isolate the camel in a small pen separate from the area it was previously in. These symptoms could be from a number of toxins (among other things), but I would be thinking in terms of heavy metal (lead) poisoning, pesticides, poisonous plants, etc. It sounds like she is sedated! I would also recommend that they find another vet, maybe one who was more experienced in camels or at least in horses and/or cattle. The camel needs a complete blood workup as well.
Please reply to cameldoctor@horsevet.net