Decontamination

I didn’t get much sleep last night as there was a pair of Staffordshire Bull Terriers or Staffies running outside our yard in the veldt much to the excitement of all the dogs. We asked on the chat forums if anyone are missing any staffies but not a peep. My neighbour Pieter let them into his yard for safekeeping till the morning and that is when our sleepless night started for us and our neighbour. The strange staffies caused all the dogs in the neighbourhood in a barking mood right into the wee hours of this morning.

Good news is that we found the owners first thing in the morning bad news that was not the end of my troubles today.

So here I was trying to keep my open when I got a phone call from Lynda. Ella, her son Dale’s house mate’s Boerboel puppy was very sick with vomiting and loss of appetite. Since their car was still off the road due to being repaired from an accident they had no way to take Ella to the vet. A boerboel is a South African Mastiff a large dog but Ella is still a 6 month old puppy.

I picked up Dael and Ella and took them to the vet. Bad news is that Ella has been diagnosed with a deadly virus called Parvo. She has been hospitalised and treatment will take up to 5 days with 1 out 4 dogs not surviving the treatment.

Since the virus is highly contagious especially to puppies, I had to decontaminate my pickup and as soon as I got home I took a nice long shower. Our dogs are older and although this virus comes from cats it doesn’t affect them but I was taking no chances.