Gundog Nation
A show to bring together gundog enthusiasts, trainers, and handlers with discussion focused on all breeds and styles of gundogs.
Gundog Nation
Gundog Nation #007: The Drake Project, Heterobilharzia Americana Research Institute
In this episode of Gundog Nation, Ken Witt discusses The Drake Project with veterinarians Kate and Lea, focusing on a significant health issue affecting dogs related to a specific parasite. The conversation covers the parasite's life cycle, symptoms in dogs, community awareness, and the ongoing research efforts at Texas A&M University. The veterinarians emphasize the importance of educating dog owners about this parasite, its detection, and the need for better diagnostic tools and treatments. In this conversation, Ken Witt engages with Kate and Lea to discuss the prevalence, treatment, and complexities of Heterobilharzia in dogs. They explore the differences in breed susceptibility, the importance of combined treatment protocols, and the challenges of diagnosing and treating this infection. The discussion also highlights the need for community support and awareness regarding this emerging health issue in dogs.
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Hello and welcome to Gun Dog Nation. This is Kenneth Witt and I'm coming to you from Texas. I want you to know that Gun Dog Nation is more than just a podcast. It's a movement to unite those who want to watch a well-trained dog do what it's bred to do. Also, we are set out to try to encourage youth, to get encouraged in the sport of gun dogs, whether it's hunting, competition, trials, hunt test, all the above. This is a community of people that are united to preserve our heritage of gundog ownership and also to be better gundog owners. So if you'll stay tuned to all of our episodes, we're going to have people on here to educate you about training, about nutrition, health. Anything can make you a better gundog owner. It's my pleasure to welcome our listeners and please join our community. All right, you're listening to Gundog Nation. This is Kenneth Witt.
Speaker 1:I am in Texas recording today with two other very educated ladies in Texas, on the other side of the state. I'm in West Texas, they're in Southeast, so we're going to talk about a very important topic today. I'm not going to get into too much because I don't want to say anything wrong or make the wrong mispronounce a word, because I've tried to read this word and I'm not even going to make an attempt at my hilly tongue to pronounce that, but it's a very important health issue for dogs. Again, on this podcast we talk about lots of stuff training, nutrition, taking care of dogs. Health is obviously number one, even for hunting dogs, but what they're going to talk about affects all breeds of dogs, so it's not just something that's affecting hunting dogs. So first I'll let the two doctors introduce themselves, kate, I'll let you go, and then then late okay, hi, my name is Kate Eicher.
Speaker 2:I'm a veterinarian and I'm a small animal internal medicine specialist and I'm on faculty at Texas A&M and I get to do all sorts of cool things. I teach vet students and then I'm on clinics here and see some complicated cases that come in for internal medicine, and then I get to do research with my partner in crime here, leah, and do a lot of research in canine and gastrointestinal disease.
Speaker 1:And Leah is not really a Texas native, is she?
Speaker 3:She comes from a beautiful country I've been, to Germany.
Speaker 1:Tell us about where you're from.
Speaker 3:Exactly so. I'm from Bavaria in Germany. I graduated in Munich last year and had heard a lot about the GI lab and eventually saw this position opening up and applied and got lucky enough to be accepted. So I started here in the GI lab in January of this year and have been working with Kate, my mentor, ever since.
Speaker 1:What's interesting, kate, is I'm from Southeast Kentucky, so I'm Appalachian, I think that qualifies as hillbilly. She speaks better English than I do.
Speaker 2:No, she is. I mean, I would have there's not even an accent. I know.
Speaker 1:And I'm sure most Americans can understand her easier than me.
Speaker 3:Well, thank you, I appreciate the compliment.
Speaker 1:So well. Thank you all for being here. Thank you for taking time. We have a technical issue and you ladies like adapted, rolled, moved, and it took a lot of trouble out of your day and I really appreciate it. I know you all have a very busy day, but I also know this is dear to your hearts, so we're going to dive into this topic and educate the public. So I'll just start off with saying I know these word I can pronounce it's called the Drake Project.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Ladies, tell us about that.
Speaker 2:OK, well, the Drake Project is our sort of easier to follow name for our, our smaller research group within a really big research group in the GI lab here at Texas A&M. So our small research group is called the Drake Project and we named the Drake Project after a patient that was really dear to my heart, a lovely dog named Drake, and he was a really stubborn, stoic but also very ill with this parasite that we investigate. I mean, his name was Drake and he had a very committed owner who just was like hey, please, you know, figure out what's going on with my dog and try to make him better. And we found that he had this parasite and we were able to treat him for that, but he had developed some complications related to the parasite and he had to be euthanized. And we were able to treat him for that, but he had developed some complications related to the parasite and he had to be euthanized.
Speaker 2:And we were really heartbroken and you know his owner had said something really important, which was I didn't know about this parasite. And you know, is this something that if I'd known about or if I tested for earlier, would I still have my dog. And so we sort of made this commitment to say, well, we're going to, we're going to try to learn more about this, and and so that was sort of how it all began. And we added some other folks to the team. So Leah is one of the team members, and then we have a whole bunch of other folks that people that interact with us, get to email, correspond with that are not on camera. So Leah was going to mention some of those folks as well.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so we started with just Kate Francis, who is another grad student here at the GI Lab, and me, and now we've expanded pretty drastically. We're now having Hannah on board. She's a vet student who did amazing research work within our project in the southwestern United States. And then we have some other brilliant students Morgan Mackenzie, polina, kelsey, dakota and Caroline so these names might sound familiar to some people who have been working with us. Yeah, they're all amazing and on our team.
Speaker 1:Now you all talk about a parasite. You know, we we weren't't we're dogs for parasites, but this is something different, correct?
Speaker 2:Yeah, yep.
Speaker 1:That was what makes this different.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's a. So it's a parasite that that's sort of the normal fecal test that dogs get when they go into their vet's office. So there's this whole list of you know things like vaccinations, heartworm prevention, flea tick prevention, and they usually get a fecal test and it's called a fecal float and it actually won't find this parasite the vast majority of the time. So it's something that could go undetected, and then the preventatives that dogs get don't normally protect them from it. So there's nothing that we know of right now, which we hope to try to change in the future, and it's also just not well known even here in Texas, where it's been for a while and now the idea is popping up in other places. It's something where these dogs some dogs can get really sick and if their vets don't even know about this and their tests don't find it, you know. So it's all these sort of things that had given us concern.
Speaker 2:So the majority of the vets I guess just generalizing can't even detect this parasite, you're saying yeah, with the normal tools that they would use in their hospital, and then you know what really made us mad at this parasite. So Drake was a lovely patient. He was a Labrador tugged on my heartstrings because I have two Labrador ladies at home and they're like heat seeking missiles for water. So this parasite the dogs can get water that affected this breed and then thinking about all of the other dogs that that work in or have fun playing in water that could be at risk Leah has also a Labrador, so we're really really committed to thinking about this particular parasite could potentially affect a breed that we really loved dearly.
Speaker 1:Is it only contracted in water or is there other ways to contract the parasite?
Speaker 3:Yeah, so water is really the risk factor that we know of. There is no way to basically transmit the parasite from one dog to the other just by them being in contact. So they're always because parasites have life cycles and they just have to go through different stages of development. It's not possible again that a dog can just give this to another dog just by being close to it. But a dog would have to wade in water, swim in water, maybe even just drink out of a source of fresh water, to be at risk of becoming infected.
Speaker 1:Is it still like some parasite? Can it be contracted by feces, by waste, animal waste?
Speaker 2:In theory. Yeah, this life cycle is really weird, so I'll let Leigh talk about that as well, because you have to have a dog and you have to have water, and then there's also another part to the whole process. That's sort of strange, but really important.
Speaker 3:Yeah. So again, parasites have life cycles. They have to move through these different stages, and we also know that parasites need hosts, right, and there are different kinds of hosts. There is a definitive host, which would be a mammal like our dogs or raccoons out in the wild, and then there is intermediate hosts that only serve as like a short-term, temporary environment for the parasite to move into its next stage. So, basically, what happens? If a mammal, let's say a dog, is infected, they will shed parasite eggs in their feces. So, let's say, a dog poops somewhere he's infected or she there are parasites in its poop.
Speaker 3:So what happens now is if these parasite eggs come in contact with fresh water, they'll hatch. So they need the component of water in some sense. They will hatch and then they will seek out their intermediate snail host, which is usually a snail that belongs to the family of pond snails. They're really small, kind of hard to identify, you know, because there are so many snails that look alike. So what this parasite does is it infects the snail first, spends a couple weeks within the snail, develops and then leaves the snail again back in the water. And you know, because they're usually pond snails, it could be a river, it could be a pond, it could be any body of water really, um, fresh water only, but um. So it will leave the snail and swim around for maybe a day. They don't live forever.
Speaker 3:But if a dog now comes in pro close proximity to the parasite, the parasite is able to infect the dog just by penetrating the dog's skin. So they just go through intact skin. It's pretty creepy to think about. And then within the dog they go through a whole new migration. So basically, what they do is they enter these dermal blood vessels, right, so blood vessels in their skin, because you can think of blood vessels almost like a highway that connects the entire body. Right through the blood vessels. Um, the parasite can travel first to the lungs, then to the liver, obviously causing damage in these organs and in the liver. They will mature into adult male and female flapworms. So they're little worms and they end up eventually settling down in the veins that take care of the gastrointestinal tract. So they live there, they lay their eggs there, and eggs can then get distributed in the dog's entire body or go back into their intestine and be shed again with the dog's feces, and that would be like the end of the cycle now.
Speaker 1:So, as you see, the water and the snail they have to be in place for an infection to move on to the next dog. So is this parasitis? Can it be seen with a naked eye, like a tapeworm? Is it microscopic?
Speaker 3:Yes, you wouldn't be able to just identify it. It's tiny, microscopic, as you said.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Okay, are you all finding that this snail is all over the US? Is it in certain regions of the United States? Yeah, what have you found?
Speaker 3:So technically, we don't know all of the snails that could be capable of supporting the life cycle right, we know the snails that we've been, or researchers that we've been collaborating, and other researchers. We know that they were able to prove that certain species are capable of doing it, but there might as well be so many more that we don't even know of and technically, they occur worldwide, so they could be anywhere, which is obviously a huge potential for a disease to spread, not even just in the US, but also other countries.
Speaker 1:Okay, I'm going to ask you all, just as a dog owner slash amateur trainer and you all too, you're dog owners. We watch our dogs. We know when their feed is not enough, they're not getting enough nutrition, maybe their coat, their hair, whatever that sign might be. We also can usually tell when a dog is wormy. That's not the great scientific word to use, but we can see that a lot. How will we ever know that our dog has this dangerous parasite? Is there other signs that you look for as an owner.
Speaker 1:So we know to go to that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's a great question and I think what's really interesting is that so I can tell you about the symptoms that happen in dogs and some dogs may not have symptoms at all or they may not for a long period of time that those are the questions we need to answer. But I think, when specifically thinking cause you know, Leigh and I get to live in this like perfect part of Texas where we have all of these you know these working retriever dogs that are here that traveled in this area and train and and as a clinician, sometimes some of these dogs come here for other reasons and they might have a history of weight loss and I think that's always something like they're, you know, with a new trainer or they've got a new training program, or you know these dogs all. They're just like amazing, but I imagine they're really hard to keep body condition on, so you always have to try to make sure. Is there something really simple like that, okay?
Speaker 1:I'm gonna interject just one second because I'm gonna tell the rest of the people listening throughout the us. I didn't realize until I was over in that area in the spring. But that part of Texas, the College Station, LaGrange, that whole area is like the mega capital of Labrador.
Speaker 2:Retriever training in the wintertime.
Speaker 1:It's amazing, it's another reason that some of the best clubs in the United States are those clubs. But I just didn't realize. The campgrounds get full of guys from Minnesota, north Dakota that can't train water dogs because the rivers are frozen, the water's frozen Michigan, upper Peninsula, wherever and those guys all come down south.
Speaker 1:Now not just to Texas, but a lot of them come to Texas and it's crazy. You'll see dog trotters in campgrounds. You know a mile long. So that's what Kate's talking about. I hate to interrupt her, but for most people you are in the capital of the retriever world in the United States.
Speaker 2:In my opinion, yeah, and that's a really like Ken. We'll come back to the symptoms because I want to make sure to answer that question, but I want to also. I think that part of our story is really cool about this. So, you know, drake was just monumental in terms of changing things. Not we hadn't seen this infection before, but it was just.
Speaker 2:It just frankly pissed me off that this lovely dog is no longer here from a parasite, and so it was one of those things where it made me also sad, mad for Labradors.
Speaker 2:And then I started to have an awareness, to your point, about the fact that we were right here in the middle of the Mecca and I thought, holy smokes, here's this parasite that people don't know about. Here's this amazing, committed, you know, dog owning, training, handling, thriving community that comes here. They travel all over the place. We started to become aware of other parts of the country that had dogs that were infected, and so it just sort of was one of those things to think holy smokes, is this something really important we need to investigate? And then I was really trying to get involved in the Labrador Retriever community. I'm pretty sure I ended up on some sort of like creepy lady watch list of like emailing all these people. And then one day, when I was trying to submit a grant proposal and I just wanted to have somebody tell me something more concrete that I could put into it, that I Facebook messaged Kelly Curry at our local Retriever Club, which, unknowingly also, we have a fantastic the Bryan College Station Retriever Club is top notch.
Speaker 1:I'm a member there, even though I live eight hours away.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and Kelly immediately responded, talked to me and was like what can we do to support? And he connected us with all of these people in this community. We're sort of like the crazy poop ladies going to all the hunt tests in the spring, you know, talking about this parasite, and it was something where I just wanted to make sure to like talk about that part of the story because that really was monumental for helping us move this forward. And then we have a larger community now but it was really cool to start that here and be so connected. And you know, master national is going to be here in gettings next year. Like it's just, I mean, what a cool place to live, but what an important question to ask in these dogs yeah and kate, I think you all agree with me, I hope, and if you don't, be honest.
Speaker 1:But people hunters and this is one reason I have this podcast People get a hunters gun. Dog owners get a bad rap. The general public has no idea how much people like me and people in all these labs the money, the time, the health, I mean they're well taken care of. Dogs. Would you agree? Absolutely.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, I mean, and as a clinician here.
Speaker 1:There's exceptions, sure, yeah. Yeah, I mean as a general rule.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I would agree, and I think that when I think about Retrievers and you go to a hunt test for the first time, you're going to see these dogs just like that's all they wanted to do their whole life. They're just living their wildest dreams. It's so cool to see dogs doing what they were made to do.
Speaker 1:I say that every episode. My passion is watching a dog do what it's bred to do, whether it's looking for truffles in Europe. You know there's a dog that actually does that. It's got a weird Italian name, but I love to watch a dog do what it's bred for. It's a passion. But anyway so I know we all digress and you know I'm horrible for that. Now you figure me out. You know my secret. So let's talk about the symptoms. Are there telltale signs?
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I'll let you elaborate on that.
Speaker 2:I would say that the part that's frustrating is a lot of these dogs. The signs can overlap with other things, so I say that mostly so that folks that are listening that don't immediately think like this has to be what's going on with my dog, that don't immediately think like this has to be what's going on with my dog.
Speaker 1:It will flood the vets today or when this is released Exactly.
Speaker 2:So I think sometimes you can have dogs that might just have weight loss despite the fact that they're eating well, and you have to tease that out from thinking are their calories the same? Are they working more, you know? Are there other changes?
Speaker 1:So you're seeing weight loss.
Speaker 2:Yeah, potentially weight loss, yeah.
Speaker 1:But decrease of appetite Sometimes yeah.
Speaker 2:I would say that for dogs and yeah, and I think what's really interesting about that too is like I realize that not all retrievers are the same, but my dogs, you know, they eat their breakfast and their dinner in 15 seconds, flat on a slow day.
Speaker 2:That's a lie, so you know, it may be something too where it's a subtle change. You know, if my dog's walked away from their bowl with some food in it, that's going to be like a 911. Something is wrong situation. So I think change in appetite, diarrhea Sorry to you know, talk about gross things but diarrhea and sometimes it can be that they have blood in the diarrhea or they might end up having vomiting, and sometimes dogs will have vomiting of blood. We just had a couple of patients that were here earlier this week and that was what their family had observed as one of their symptoms.
Speaker 1:So, kate and Leah, when you, when there's the diarrhea, is it, like you know, coccidia has this foul odor that you, you can't disguise from anything else, or you can't, you know, some, some fecal, that's. I'm using wrong words and this is your expertise. I feel stupid. So some of that stuff has an odor, that's just. You detect it, you know it's a bacteria.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:In this situation? Do you see that odor, or is it anything other than runny? You know runny, for lack of a better word.
Speaker 2:I think it varies, you're right, like you know, runny, for lack of better words. I think it varies, you're right. Like you know, people talk about how Parvo diarrhea smells. That's really classic. I will bless Drake's lovely heart in heaven, but I do know that when he was here in the hospital he had diarrhea. That was he was perfect in every other way, but his diarrhea smelled badly and it was one of those things where you could smell it across the hospital. It was that pungent. But I would say that we just had a patient who was in the hospital two weeks ago and she was having diarrhea and I don't really feel like there was anything different about it from all the other reasons that dogs can get diarrhea. So I think it's just.
Speaker 1:It's unfortunately not like a specific Okay, so there's no smoking gun there.
Speaker 2:Yeah, okay, so there's no smoking gun there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, that's frustrating.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah, but it just goes on the list, you know. And I think the important part is that you know, let's say, what we don't do really well in vet med is like ask about access to water, you know, and say, well, tell me. And I think if people don't know what like working retrievers do for a living, they also don't really understand that. You know. And I think if, let's say, you're a veterinarian in the southwest United States and you have a family that goes camping on the Colorado River, that's going to be real darn important to know if that dog comes in and has GI signs. So I think that starting to think like what risk factors could this dog have and that might look different from you know, a dog who just lives in the city, like never goes outside, you know, then that would be not really a good, a good explanation for that dog's diarrhea are there any cases in humans or?
Speaker 1:has it just been yeah yeah.
Speaker 3:So for this particular parasite, no, it can't basically establish an infection in a human, but it can, you know, do the initiation part of like penetrating a human skin. It's actually called swimmer's itch. So it's just going to be like a local allergic reaction in humans, but it's not known to really infect or like cause any further damage. However, there is basically like a human I don't want to say variant, but like a human form of this particular parasite that is actually recognized as the second most devastating parasitic disease after malaria. So basically, the human form of this parasite. This disease is one of catastrophic impact, affecting mostly third world countries and people who obviously live and depend on sources of water there, right for fishing, for washing their clothes, for whatever. So we also look a lot to our human medicine colleagues to see what they're doing and try to learn from them and maybe apply this knowledge to our own research.
Speaker 1:Do you all have a list of states or bodies of water that this parasite's been found or confirmed?
Speaker 3:So we're working on that. We're trying to capture as much information as we can from people enrolling their dogs in our study. So, basically, anybody who wants to test their dog, right is. We're asking them to complete a questionnaire that basically asks where has your dog been? What kind of waters, bodies of water do you remember, has your dog been frequenting a lot, or can you think of anything? You know that maybe that might contribute to an infection if we find this dog to be positive. So we're trying to gather all of this data, but it is a lot right and it's also always hard to trace back. Okay, this dog might have been in that particular body of water, but it is a lot right and it's also always hard to trace back. Okay, this dog might have been in that particular body of water, but it's just a source of, in fact, infection. It might be, but it might not exactly.
Speaker 3:So we're trying and we definitely want to come up with, um, maybe a sort of map or like some sort of information to give to people to be like okay, we know for sure this is a high risk area. We don't know about these other areas, and these things are subject to change too, right, since raccoons can be affected super easily by this parasite and they're everywhere. Right, they might carry this infection from one body of water to the next within a day or two.
Speaker 1:So Are the coons Leah? Are they just carriers, or do they die from this too?
Speaker 3:That's a really good question. We honestly haven't. We don't have too much information on like how it infects, how it affects a raccoon, but there have been studies where they have been, you know, dissected, looked into and they get the same organ damage that the dog would get. So I would say they're also getting sick. But it also depends a lot on the burden, the parasitic burden right. A raccoon might be fine if they just have a few parasites right in their system. I mean, they have other parasites as well. So they do have some sort of resistance to these things, right, or they wouldn't thrive so well out there. So it depends. But they're not immune to the effects that this disease has.
Speaker 1:And you know, I wonder too how it would affect if any. You know I have coon dog hunters. I actually had the world champion coon dog on this podcast. It was from my hometown. That's ironic. I mean, his father and I grew up probably less than a quarter mile from each other.
Speaker 2:Wow.
Speaker 1:But you know those dogs are hunting coons and you know they don't always trap them, but they're. They could end up in their mouths easily.
Speaker 2:Yeah, ken, it's really interesting One of the other. So there has been and I bring this up because we have a lot of folks that are really interested in the snail aspect and I remember when I first started talking about this here that a lot of the folks in the retriever club were asking about snails, because snails are obviously required for this to happen. But it was also interesting for thinking about like duck hunting dogs and ducks like to eat snails too. So that puts like ducks and snails and dogs like all at the same place and what's hard. Like to Leigh's point earlier, she talked about how small they are and how they look like so many others. So we are really lucky.
Speaker 2:I want to give a shout out to our snail collaborator experts.
Speaker 2:So there is there are two groups that have done a lot of work where they've actually been able to prove that the infection is in a specific body of water, and one of those was a group out of New Mexico and also our parasitologist had investigated like a man-made pond in Utah, moab, utah, and then our colleagues at UC Riverside were the ones that actually found the snails and found them to be infected with the parasite in this town called Blythe, which is right on the California-Arizona border. So now we really think the Colorado River, you know, is potentially a source for dogs, like exactly where, how or what part we have to tease out. But in the West coast there's less, you know, there's less bodies of water. If I get in a plane and fly up over Texas, it's just like pond, pond, pond, pond, pond, pond, and you think about the dogs that come through here and train and travel and they've seen who knows how many, you know training are here and train and travel and they've seen who knows how many.
Speaker 1:You know training ponds and grounds, that they've been on different types of water and if my correct me if I'm wrong. Okay, I know my geography might be a little weak, but the colorado river runs all the way through texas, okay oh is that the same river? Right, it is the same, isn't it?
Speaker 2:no, actually. Well, I'm not. I'm. I wonder if somebody's going to be listening to this. That's going to be a Colorado River expert. But this gave us a lot of confusion because we're like wait, the Colorado River is like in Austin, right and comes through Texas.
Speaker 2:But this actually goes all the way up to basically like Colorado, literally, literally. And then it comes down through Utah and then it comes like along the side of Nevada and Arizona and then runs on the border between Arizona and Colorado I'm sorry, not to Colorado Arizona and California, and so that's it. It's sort of a different color direction.
Speaker 1:Okay, yes, you know, I mean because it that the one we're talking about starts here in West Texas and goes all the way through to Houston.
Speaker 2:Right, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's better. Yeah, so are you guys the only. Are there other projects in the United States that are doing what you're doing, that are working on this, trying to find a cure, trying to find a diagnosis, what all is going on?
Speaker 2:besides the Texas A&M project, yeah. So I think what we, we're positioned right now because we see so many of these cases in Texas, unfortunately, and also we work in the GI lab. So there's a lab here, a bigger lab that specialized in GI disease, pancreatic disease, liver disease in dogs and cats, and we have a lab where people can send us tests and, like for a you know, pay a fee. It's like we're a nonprofit, so it's less than a, you know, a lab for profit, but they'll send us. So veterinarians all over the country will send us tests to run. One of them happens to be the fecal test for heterobleharzia.
Speaker 2:So it's one of those things where we actually were already set up to be able to do all the testing here, and so we are sort of really well positioned, I think, to receive samples and collaborate with veterinarians. So there are other veterinarians out there who have investigated this a little bit and have put out a little bit of literature which has been really helpful. But we're really there's not been that much movement on it until we came in here, and now we're so positioned to be able to try to make a difference here, and a lot, a lot of that is because of community support and and in being willing to test their dogs and give us more information and tell us about our dogs. So we work with some people at other universities who might have a case or two and they want to ask us for some advice, but really in terms of of like, who's really working and digging on this, that's, that's our group.
Speaker 1:It's you? Okay, it's, are you all? It's your goal. I assume this is one of your goals. I know you have many goals, but do you want to get a diagnostic testing to every vet, or is that an end goal?
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And is that feasible?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean. So our, like you know, pie in the sky dreams would make it so that veterinarians know about it, dogs, dog owners know about it, that there's an easy and accessible and affordable test and that dogs who would have risk for infection that this becomes a part of their standard recommendation. You know, looking for this, perhaps finding it when dogs don't have any symptoms, so that they could just get treated and not necessarily only be found to have this if they get really sick, and so that's part of it. And then we want to. You know, like Leah said earlier, we have taken a lot of information from people to try to use that in dogs. We're also following a lot of dogs who've been treated to see like, what did they get, what doses did they get and how did things turn out for them.
Speaker 2:What happens to dogs who are infected and they don't get treated? Why is it that some dogs can get really sick and some other dogs might not? So we want to understand that, so that also we can just tell people what's the best thing to do. And we also would really like to think that there's a way that we could think about what's a preventative drug and dose that would set dogs up for success Because, to be very honest, like my dogs, I'm not going to stop putting them in water. That's what they love. Their entire life revolves around that, and so saying don't put your dog in water is not something that is going to be good for you know a dog's happiness, for their owner's happiness, their job, you know, like what they were trained and want to do.
Speaker 1:Yeah, has the AKC or the UKC or these organizations stepped in to help you guys?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I think in terms of support, working with a lot of AKC organizations here in Texas has been great. I'm really glad you brought that up because in terms of thinking about how do we get support for doing some of this research, is that the tests that come into the GI lab that there's that their veterinarians and owners pay a fee for. We are able to reinvest that back into research to some extent. But we also apply for grants. So that was actually how I met Kelly Curry here locally was trying to get some support for that.
Speaker 2:So the AKC has this Canine Health Foundation and what that is is that's a really prestigious place to try to be able to get funding. They have people that look at these grant proposals and they look at them really carefully to make sure that the question is appropriate, that it's going to help dogs, that it's achievable, and so we actually put in a grant proposal last October a year ago, and it got funded. So that's specifically for Leah's work to look at Labrador Retrievers specifically in Texas and to try to be able to look at their risk and that kind of thing. So we got support from them. We are also we have a proposal pending with our collaborators in UC Riverside who were helping with the snails and the water. You know, expertise part of things. So that's that's how we try to be able to get support. And then it's really cool. We we've gotten to be able to be supported by the AKC Canine Health Foundation is something we're really proud of.
Speaker 1:We know it's just a lawyer in me, but I think about. Akc offers health insurance for animals and it looks like the health that the animal health insurance industry would want to get involved and get on top of this thing too, because you know, and maybe that's not a covered coverage at this time.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it should be.
Speaker 1:Yeah. So I've almost been afraid to ask this question, but I just got to know. I mean, does this, is it killing every dog that contracts it, or dogs that live this, that live through it and survive?
Speaker 2:I would say it's a mix Like. Through this project we've done a lot of testing on dogs who don't have any symptoms and and some of their families make a decision to not treat. You know, I can understand that thinking well, my dog's not showing any symptoms. Some of the drugs that we have to use to treat this make dogs feel a little bit punier than normal dewormers. And yet, you know, here in the hospital as a clinician, I see cases like Drake.
Speaker 2:I see cases like there were two dogs that were in through our ER service on Monday and they'd been really sick for a while. We had a patient who was just hospitalized two weeks ago. There's just like this constant drum of if you're coming into a hospital like Texas A&M and you're being seen by an internist, you're being hospitalized, like then your dog is pretty sick and that I feel like that's too far. And we've had a lot of success with treating dogs, especially if they're not, you know, really, really, really sick when we make the diagnosis. Or in Drake's case, he had some complications secondary to the infection that we couldn't turn around. But I think for the most part, most dogs, if they're sick and we catch this early enough and their families are able to, you know, support them through treatment and and sometimes hospitalization if they're really sick. Then we can make a lot of these dogs better, which is cool.
Speaker 1:I've got so many questions and I'm trying not to just blow y'all up. But, um, do you, do we have numbers that we know, how many dogs in the U? S that we know of have at least reported cases? Is there a number? I'm just curious, you know, are you allowed to give that, or do you feel the liberty to give that?
Speaker 2:Well, I guess. So part of Leah's whole like project was to try to talk about prevalence, so I'll let her kind of speak a little bit about, I guess, what we know and, more importantly like, what we don't know.
Speaker 3:So I can't give specific numbers yet, but what I can say is we're looking here in Texas at three groups specifically. One is our Labrador Retrievers that do go in the water a lot, right, because we're looking at this breed specifically too because historically this was the breed that was most commonly represented when it came to heterobalharzia cases. But we're also looking at a comparison group, which is actually a group of hounds that also go in the water a lot, because we were also curious is there a difference in breed susceptibility, right? Or is there maybe aspects of immunity in some of these dogs or not? And then our third group is um. Labrador retrievers, who do not go in any water. Say their real name, what we call them the land-based labradors, yeah and um. So we're looking at these three different groups and what was surprising to find was that it seemed like hounds were affected more so, more frequently, than the water Labrador retrievers. Water-based labs.
Speaker 1:You think it's because they're thick coats and the hounds have little short coats, or does that have anything to do with it?
Speaker 2:I don't know. The interesting thing is there are a lot of different possibilities. What I think was really important is that through this work, you know, we went out trying to figure out prevalence. We thought, well, let's get the highest risk breed. You know that people have said so far and doing the highest risk work, and we wondered, since we haven't found, you know, that match, like in that particular group, we wondered are they developing some sort of immunity? Is there something that they have from, like maybe repeated exposure that would be different from the others? And we also wanted to make sure that people didn't get blinders on and say, well, this isn't a lab, it's not going to get this infection, because we've diagnosed Jack Russell Terriers, chihuahuas, frenchies, like name, a breed, and so this is something that affects all breeds. But I wonder, if something, once we analyze Leia's data, about whether we'll find something that might be able to help all dogs. Who knows?
Speaker 1:Yeah, it was just my first reaction when you said that. I thought you know all hounds have. Most hounds have really short hair, thin hair, but two hounds is what I'm thinking right now. That's a really interesting thought you know, yeah, they have an undercoat, an Ollie coat, and you know I don't know, I'm just curious. But that's interesting, so I'll let you finish like because you were getting on a really important topic. Yeah, Sorry.
Speaker 3:Basically. To wrap this up, while I can't give any specific numbers yet, it seems like where we're looking, we're finding it, not always to the same degree, right, but we've been receiving samples from Pennsylvania, right. We've been looking in Florida. We found it a few times. We saw it. Well, we always knew it was common in Gulf Coast and Southern Atlantic states. Right, it was reported in the Carolinas before Alabama, louisiana. That's not necessarily new information, but there are definitely, especially in California, arizona and Utah, more and more cases, and so I feel like if you, you know, have a dog you live in, that area might be wise just keep it in mind, you know to maybe get your dog tested, because it really can't hurt, because we just don't know, like, how fast heterobulharzia is spreading where it is spreading. We don't want to cause any panic. Obviously you know you could be totally fine where you are, but it's just something to keep in the back of your mind okay, and I guess it's fair to say both y'all that just cause it's half.
Speaker 1:Let's just say I don't know for an example of, like, some certain lake in utah that you've had just because they jump in the water and back out doesn't mean they caught it, it's. There's more to it than that. Right, there has to be a, an attaching, and you know, a touch. Whatever. That's not the right word, but you know what I'm saying. So it's more than just jumping in, jumping out or playing for a few minutes no for sure.
Speaker 3:I mean there always have to be factors in place. It's kind of like for us, right, when we're in an elevator with someone who's sick you might get it, you might not right, and no one really knows why that is. And it's kind of similar for our dogs that get in water. It also might differ on like the speed of water right or like are they more towards like the border of a river, or are they if someone taking their dog on a boat and they go all the way in the center of a lake right, and maybe it's better there because there are no snails, possibly directly there? So we're trying to uncover these patterns. But um no, as you said, just because a dog is in water does not mean like they're for sure going to have it you should talk about what?
Speaker 2:we learned about with the like um daylight, dust kind of thing, with the snails and the, the cercuria, the part that comes out of the snails um, about them being shed, mostly in the evening.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so it's interesting. So, snails, they're obviously living creatures too, right, they have some sort of differences in their biology and when it comes to temperatures, when it comes to nighttime, daytime, right. So, um, what we've been seeing is, first of all, warmer temperatures seem to increase, um, the activity, like that, what that's what literature says seems to increase, basically just like biological activity of snails and potentially also the occurrence of heterobulharzia americana, um.
Speaker 3:but it's also interesting that there are like different times of day where they're more likely to shed right, which is um I've been reading about it in the evening or early morning time, so kind of like dusk, dawn, um, types of the day. So that's interesting too. There might be, it might be, a safer hour in the day and since you're only live for like about a day, maybe shorter.
Speaker 1:There's so many variables, it sounds just crazy yeah. Well one thing we've not really dived into is we talked about treatment. What is the treatment that you offer for dogs that have this?
Speaker 3:So the treatment consists of two different kinds of drugs that we use in combination, which is really important to highlight because obviously this infection is new and many vets aren't really familiar with it yet, so they might think it's okay to choose between one of the two drugs, but what we've been experiencing it is that it's really important to use them in combination. So one of them is called prosiquantel they're using the same exact thing in human medicine, actually and the other one is fenbendazole, which probably dog owners have heard of, maybe, maybe not like panicure yeah, horse warmer yeah, but warmer, warmer yes exactly.
Speaker 3:So we're using those in combination and we use pretty high doses of prosaequantel, doses that are kind of unheard of for many vets when they're first, um, yeah, confronted with treating this infection. It also can make dogs feel pretty sick, pretty puny, on top of already being sick, right. So Kate and I always try to highlight that there is also a need of supportive treatment. If you treat it, it's not just a parasite needing to be eliminated, but it's also just a dog needing to be supported through this treatment. Yeah, so high doses of Proziquantel is usually what we're seeing has a good effect when it comes to treatment. However, there are also low-dose protocols that veterinarians and researchers have been looking into. So they just try to use lower doses that seem to be a little more easy on the dog's system. There, while there is some treatment success, um, with those lower doses, they're not super reliable.
Speaker 3:So what we always um emphasize and what is so important, is the retesting aspect of treatment. Usually what we do is we do a first round of treatment and then we wait four weeks, and these four weeks just give the dog the time to basically clear out whatever is in their system. It takes a while for them to release these eggs, even if the parasite might already be dead. Right, it's not like this and the dog is going to be cleared out of all parasites. It'll take a while. So after this first round of treatment, we wait for four weeks and then we retest. So what we do is we ask people to collect ideally three fecal samples from three consecutive days. We do that because the heterobulharzia is actually shed intermittently, so a dog might shed them on one day but not on the other, which makes it even more tricky.
Speaker 3:Right, and if we still find it, we initiate a second round of treatment and we could potentially here adjust the dose if we feel like, hmm, maybe last time wasn't enough, maybe we need more. And then we go through that second round of treatment and then test again after four weeks. So treatment test, treatment test, treatment and then test again after four weeks. So treatment test, treatment test. And something else that would probably be worth talking about is that because we need these really high doses of praline quantal, it can be hard because we don't have these drugs readily available in the required dose in veterinary medicine. So basically, if you have a dog, a labrador, you would have to feed them I don't know how many pills, yeah kate's dog.
Speaker 2:When I was in school, my dog had this infection and I I gave him the veterinary form and it was these 34 milligram tablets and I gave him like he was a big dog gave him like 50 of these. Also, he didn't have any anti-nausea drugs on board and and so, like three doses in he vomited up all the pills. And so now the nice thing is and a lot of veterinarians again, because this is just not familiar to them there's a human tablet that's bigger, the 600 milligram tablet. So now for a bigger dog, we can say, you know, depending on their weight, like here's one tablet which is a lot better than trying to give me and also we try to be really thoughtful about giving them anti-nausea medications and having those on board.
Speaker 2:If the medications are going to make them feel sick, then maybe we can help them feel a bit better during their treatment period. So we lay and I have a whole lot of like you should do this. We think this is best kind of things. But ultimately, the majority of dogs in our study they're not our patients. You know, and we of things, but ultimately the majority of dogs in our study. They're not our patients, you know, and we trust and value their veterinarians knowing, like what, what they need?
Speaker 3:yeah, and one other thing I just thought of is, um, the possibility of compounded medication. So basically there are certain pharmacies who offer to compound certain drugs, like prosiquantel, which basically just means that, um, the drug can be, or the drug can be, or the medication can be tailored to the specific needs of that patient. For example, they can modify the dose, they can turn it into a liquid or that has, you know, a nice flavor for a dog or a doable tablet. So that might be something for vets and that could be helpful to know that this is something that can be explored.
Speaker 1:Well, you know the first thing I thought. I'm afraid to say this on here, but it sounds like y'all was using the backyard COVID treatment that people were using, you know, the wormer and ivermectin nevermind.
Speaker 1:But that's interesting. So I guess I was trying to think of how this just all works when I'm listening to y'all. But is the, are the parasites confined to the digestive and, in terms, you know, the intestines, the digestive system? Is that where it's all confined to? Is that the way to get it out? Or is it in the bloodstream? And I'm not, you know, I'm not medically trained, so I might be sounding foolish.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, I'll let Leah talk about all the places it could be and then I can tell you from, like, the clinician standpoint about what that looks like and how we tried it, because there's some really interesting things that this infection can do. So we'll like make it a two-part thing.
Speaker 1:Okay, yeah, so we'll make it a two part. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah. So the answer is both. You said both Right. You said are they in the blood vessels? The answer is yes, and they're also in organs Right, which makes this tricky again. So, technically, they lay their eggs in the bloodstream and then the bloodstream takes these eggs and brings them to the next organ, where then, basically trapped Right organ, we're then basically trapped right. This could be the liver, this could be the pancreas. We've seen structures that looked like they're, you know, eggs and tissues and kidneys. There's other, you know it doesn't just affect dogs, there's also cases in horses or just other mammals, and they found it in the lungs, you know. So there is infinite possibilities. Well, does it attack that organ, like if?
Speaker 1:found it in the lungs, you know. So there is infinite possibilities well, does it attack that organ, like if it's in the lungs, that attack the lung or the liver.
Speaker 3:So the problem is, um, it does yes and no, so basically it is a foreign body right in that tissue and the immune system will then cause inflammation, right, because our body wants to get rid of anything that doesn't belong there. And then, with that inflammation, with the presence of this, um, this egg, and also the fact that these eggs can actually release a type of enzyme or protein that they use to basically you could think of it as like eat their way through the intestinal wall, like through from the bloodstream into the intestine, right. So there it's kind of an interplay between the egg being able to migrate by using these enzymes and these proteins, but also the immune system attacking it right, with a bunch of different cells and causing inflammation and just exaggerating that whole process. So it's like a really complex interplay with both.
Speaker 1:Wow, yeah, and it's so hard to treat.
Speaker 2:Well it's.
Speaker 2:I mean, I think the part is what you know Leah described in terms of this inflammation that happens is part of the problem, and so I think some of the things that we'll see would be that if there's these eggs in the intestine, there's a bunch of inflammation around them, then that might be why a dog starts to have vomiting or diarrhea or has bleeding.
Speaker 2:You know, in their GI tract, for example, that they, you know, pass out in their poop. It can be in their pancreas and it can cause problems where the pancreas can't do its job properly. Or dog gets pancreatitis, it can be in the liver and then the liver is affected and can't do its job properly. Or dog, you know, gets pancreatitis, it can be in the liver and then the liver is affected and can't do its job. So I mean, that's why we're like. This is, you know, a parasite that we're pretty pissed at because it can do all these things and sometimes we. What we need to also better understand for these dogs is sometimes the infection's treated, but all that inflammation that they had while the parasite was there has left some you know.
Speaker 2:so that dog needs support for whatever that might be. So that's another thing we're trying to understand. Sometimes this is a kind of a interesting like I'd rather the dogs don't have this parasite, but it's kind of a interesting cool thing that we found, which is that it causes all that inflammation. It'll cause this what we call mineralization, which basically means that it's sort of like speckly appearance. And what's been really helpful about that is that we started to not we, I can't take credit for that, we can't take credit for that.
Speaker 2:That was some people before us, radiologists that found that dogs would have this sort of classic appearance with their belly x-ray that you could see that their intestines were sort of outlined with this line of brightness.
Speaker 2:Drake had that. Drake had he has a full litter mate who a female who completely recovered with treatment. She had that it can make this really speckly appearance in the liver, in the pancreas and the intestines, so that when dogs get an ultrasound that their vet might be able to appreciate that. So it was really big deal when people saw that, because if you see that with either an x-ray or an ultrasound you could be really darn suspicious and then that helps that vet say whoa, whoa, I'm gonna test this dog, I'm to go ahead and see if we can find eggs in the poop and be able to treat. So that has been really, really helpful information that came along, and it's you know, all vets can do an x-ray of the belly, you know. So it's just that if they see that, it's like burnt in their brain to say, oh, that's that, you know weird parasite that has that long name. But I'm going to test for it.
Speaker 1:And nothing else that you know of causes that kind of crystallizing, mineralizing look. Is that unique just to this parasite?
Speaker 2:I guess I'll never say you know, medicine, like veterinary medicine, is a humbling place. We learn something new, something changes.
Speaker 1:It's like dog training, exactly yeah.
Speaker 2:We're just here for the ride, so I would say that I wouldn't say never. I think there's some, like some dogs can have some other disorder but for the most part, like usually, those other things are pretty easy to see on blood work or other things that you know about the dog. So I would say it's pretty darn classic.
Speaker 1:And that's consistent. I've talked about a lot of stuff. There's so many inconsistencies I'm thinking how in the world do you know Is?
Speaker 2:that something you find that is consistent. I wouldn't say it's a hundred percent, which is really frustrating to hear. I would say that our impression is that probably takes some time to happen. So I bet those dogs are infected for a longer period of time for that to happen, and so a dog who's early you may not see that at all, which is probably better because there's things that have gone sideways, for that to show up.
Speaker 1:Do you all know and, like I said, I'm always throwing numbers at you or requests for numbers what, what would you say? And I know there's. It depends on what time you get them in, how long they've had it, how long they've been infected, but what are you seeing as a survival rate? Do you have a rough figure in mind?
Speaker 2:I think there's some reports in the literature, but that's actually really hard because all of those dogs are different.
Speaker 2:You know, some of those dogs didn't get treated.
Speaker 2:So if you don't get treated for something that's made you really sick, probably not going to do well. There are dogs that were really affected, like Drake, for example, had these other complications related to the infection, like he basically developed a cancer secondary to his infection and we weren't going to be able to make that go away, you know. But I would say, for example, we see a lot of patients back for rechecks that have been treated and they've done great, you know, and they go on and live their lives and then their families just have to try to, you know, worry like are they going to get this again? I don't want to go through, you know, just normal things that that people who love their dogs, you know, think about. So I feel like most dogs who get treated, if they can be treated, if they tolerate it okay and and you know can get a good treatment plan I feel like most of them will and they don't have complications, you know, secondary, like Drake for example then feel like we can make those patients better.
Speaker 1:You know, and I keep going back to this, and maybe this is a horrible analogy, but it's almost like COVID, right? I mean, there's people that died from COVID. Yeah, I have four kids. My son youngest has never had COVID.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Some people have symptoms and they're about to die, and some people have symptoms and they're walking around working.
Speaker 2:And.
Speaker 1:I guess it's kind of similar.
Speaker 2:Yeah absolutely.
Speaker 2:Which I think is hard, because, you know, I think folks understandably really want us to be like. You definitely should do this, because if you don't do this, then this is going to happen and we can't say that for a fact. You know, and I think that it's really hard for a lot of these families to say, well, my dog's fine, and you're telling me these drugs are going to make them feel sick. And you know, like I love my dog and I don't want them to feel sick. Why would I just, you know, why would I do that? And and so it's just, it's um, it's a tough spot to be in and we try to keep an open mind. You know, like some dogs get sick, and really sick, and that's a problem and we don't know why some do and some don't I assume that I'm not getting to your financial business, but I'm trying to.
Speaker 1:I'm going somewhere, I promise you. I assume that you all are probably a nonprofit based organization and I also would assume that you would like to have support from any place you could get it for these studies.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And how can people do that? Where would they go?
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's. I mean that's a great question. This project sort of exploded, which is really exciting, and we were trying to make expense to write.
Speaker 2:Yeah, exactly Like we have, you know, people that help Most of them are people that you know are, are like not a great salary but like literally this is kind of how it is in the university and that we've got a team that helps support these efforts. We have the supplies, you know, for testing dogs, the cost of testing for cases of dogs that live in other places, where we don't go out and actually get the fecal samples. We've got shipping to just try to make it as easy as possible. But you're right, those things add up. And so, for example, for the work that we've done here in Texas with the Labradors, which is where this whole like journey started, we have support from the AKC Canine Health Foundation. We have the opportunity here at the GI lab to take the proceeds from tests that are sent for, you know, for a fee, that we can reinvest that in research to a point.
Speaker 2:You know at some point our boss is going to say, hey, this is really exciting, and also there's a lot of other people doing research and you can't, you know, we need to figure out another way to support this.
Speaker 2:So folks wanted to know.
Speaker 2:I would say the things to consider would be there's, of course, the AKC Canine Health Foundation, because they are, you know, while that doesn't come directly to us, they are certainly an organization that helped us, and so I want to make sure that we think about them and they do really thoughtful funding of really important things that affect dogs everywhere, like that's how they, their mission is very much aligned with that.
Speaker 2:If folks are like, hey, look, we have been very deeply moved by this, we want to be a part of this, we want to focus just on being able to help you with this infection, then they certainly could reach out to us at the Drake Project and say, hey, I want to try to be able to support what does that look like? And then, of course, we're happy to receive any support if people want to do that, and then we want to know how do they want that to look. So if somebody wants to know that, they could absolutely email us at the Drake Project so drakeproject at tamuedu and let us know, message us on Facebook you know any of those things?
Speaker 1:We'd be happy to hear about it. And what's your Facebook?
Speaker 2:page. I found it yesterday.
Speaker 1:Yeah, tell the listeners that you're Facebook. How to find you on Facebook yesterday.
Speaker 2:Yeah, tell the listeners that your Facebook, have a fun on Facebook. Yeah, so if you, if you search for the Drake project, so D R A K E? Um, you'll see the Drake project that'll come up. You'll see Drake's beautiful face is our um, our picture, his little chocolate lab face, and his sister Allie is there. So he's up there and and then you'll see other words, it's the heterooboharsia Americana Research Initiative.
Speaker 2:But ultimately, if you search by that, a lot of folks. That's been the coolest thing about we have. I just want to give a shout out to our community on our Facebook page, because we had a lot of trepidation about having a Facebook group and knowing that people sometimes get into conflict and take things sideways, and our group is so amazing, like they are there. So people will post about their dog being diagnosed and they're worried or they're, or they want to share a success story. People post pictures of their dogs which, like, make our hearts explode every day and and also it's just it's like one of the few places that remain, I think, on on facebook where people are kind and supportive and I think that's because they have the common denominator of all loving their dogs to pieces or just having their life revolve around dogs. So we've just had like we've been so deeply moved by this group.
Speaker 1:We're really appreciative of them well, we'll put in the transcript of this and people can when they on all podcasts. You can look at the transcript. We'll put in the transcript of this and people can when they on all podcasts. You can look at the transcript. We'll put the. We'll put the links to your stuff on here and, on that note, while I'm talking about that, I've got a website, too for the podcast. Any information that you want me to share as a PDF, that that our people can download, If you have a map that you could share, or and then you know we've talked earlier about question and answers, I'd be glad to put that on there.
Speaker 2:That'd be great. Yeah, we would love to be able to share that, and I think for a map we can release, like what we know, preliminary, which is at least perhaps a map that just shows all the states where this has been found, and it'd be important for folks to know that all we know about that is that's where that dog lived when the sample got sent to us, but that doesn't necessarily tell us where they got it. But ultimately it's been interesting to see that map grow over time. And then what I really know, that the folks in the Southwest United States, there's all these communities that revolve around the Colorado River. They're like family homes, vacations, lives, wealth, you know, businesses, all these things that they really want a map of where all we found it. And we don't have that to be able to put out yet, but I promise that's something that we want to get out there. We just have to. We have to do it right, you know, and have the right information.
Speaker 1:You know, what's really got me just puzzled is the states you mentioned. There's like no rhyme or reason. It's like Southern warm states and then Pennsylvania and then the desert, you know, in.
Speaker 3:Utah.
Speaker 1:Arizona.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:So you've got like wet, tropical, marshy climate. You've got the desert, you've got more moderate.
Speaker 2:know in pencil, it's just yeah no rhyme or reason really is there yeah, it's wild, like arizona is a place where people diagnose valley fever, you know, and people and dogs, and we don't see that here in central texas. And so why on earth this, this freshwater parasite that requires snails, is in the middle of a desert? Is there's no rhyme?
Speaker 1:or reason and I want to make that clear too, because I've you all said that a freshwater parasite that requires snails is in the middle of a desert is. There's no rhyme or reason, and I want to make that clear too, because you all said that a couple of times. I've really paid attention to what you use the word freshwater so it's not. There's nothing found in saltwater.
Speaker 3:Correct. Yes, the beach is still a safe place. Yeah.
Speaker 2:If only we all lived there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, if only we all lived. Yeah, ladies, we had some really great structured questions, and you know how I kind of operate. Is there anything that you all would like to share that I haven't talked to you about or ask you about?
Speaker 2:Let me check the list of questions, because I think that we had um all right looking at down the list, cause we had some people that had shared questions on our Facebook groups. I'm looking down that list. You asked about other universities why we named it Drake. Um, why had it become so popular? Recently is mostly just increased awareness. You know we, we went out there and we sort of created a little bit of a stir by finding something that was there. You know, something's not there unless you don't look for it. Um was somebody had asked about other sporting breeds that we founded in. So really it's all of them you know here. We see, obviously, a lot of Labradors here in Texas with the hunt tests, but you know Goldens um.
Speaker 1:Spaniels.
Speaker 2:Brittany Spaniels Pointers, german Shorthair Pointers Um, I'd like found it in all of those talked about the snail. Um, somebody had asked about if the snail should be the target, and that's such a good common sense thing to think about. The problem is is that logistically it's really hard? And something that was really interesting is I was at one of the spring hunt tests and a handler that was there just sort of casually walked up to me. I think she'd seen me around for a bit and thought, well, I'll finally go over and talk to this crazy poop lady and she had shared with me about the number of ponds that are treated with copper sulfate to try to prevent algae and it turns out that that also could eradicate snails. So that was really interesting to think about. But for, like the Colorado River, you know that's not a strategy, but there may be some thoughts about snails you know it's probably feed on that algae.
Speaker 1:I don't know that.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:That's one reason. Not interesting and go ahead.
Speaker 2:I'm sorry no, you're doing great. Um, we talked about the treatment success rate the best that we could do. Um, somebody asked about where they could get tested, and so that's just certainly like through our email or through the qr code for the waitlist that's on our Facebook page. And talked about the map people's concern about traveling and wanting to try and totally understand that and just don't have that to be able to like concretely.
Speaker 2:Somebody had asked about myths that we can dispel and I think most of those are things that we've covered. I think that also, we just have to say there's a lot to learn, which is what we're doing, so we're not going to get arrogant ahead of ourselves and be like this is definitely the thing other than it's there. And somebody asked about cataloging articles. We can absolutely have that on our. There's some information there on our Facebook page, but it's on our once we get a little bit more caught up with testing things we want to do. Talked about funding People asked about how else they could support, so I think we really covered all those things, which is great. What a great conversation.
Speaker 1:You know too. You're talking about the coon being the host. I just this is a little off topic, but not really I go to a vet there in Menard where my ranch is, and just a small country vet, you know they had a reported rabies case from a fox, wow so. And then you know I've been told that you know coyotes and stuff carry parvo pretty bad and foxes. So I guess and I know Leah went into pretty good detail about that but I just hope that the coon is not also the next contributing factor for this parasite. You know, I think you said it has to have water. Yeah, it can't be a ground air-based transmission right no good, I mean that makes me feel better.
Speaker 1:Right, because I mean my ranch is full of coons and you know my dogs run there's, I'm sure, coon feces all over the place yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:The only question is how much water is really needed. Right, like, if maybe a lawn is flooded, would that be enough for the right a dog to walk through? And we don't know these things, so okay, but for sure, if it's, if it's just dry, there really isn't a chance as far as we know okay, interesting, that's something.
Speaker 1:Well, uh, it's alarming, but I'm still so glad we've done this and you know we need. We need to thank Kelly Curry because he called me. He's like Ken, I know this ain't completely your wheelhouse and I went. Actually, kelly, it is no, this is exactly what this is set up for. And educate animal owners and don't have to be dog owners, not just gun dogs, but any dog owner.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Well, I'm very appreciative of y'all taking your time. I want to thank you for your efforts and doing this, as I'm sure that, uh, I'm sure y'all will get paid enough to for all the work you're doing on this. It has to be a passion, and you sounds like you have a team that has the passion. So, thank all of you, but, uh, you know what? We may follow this up later.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And give an update, maybe a few months, whenever y'all want to, whenever you feel like, yeah, you know what. We got some more information, we got good information, we got bad information, but we need to at least tell the people.
Speaker 3:Yeah, holler at me.
Speaker 1:We'll do it again.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we'd be happy to yeah, thanks, so much for having us on. We really enjoyed it.
Speaker 1:All right, ladies, y'all have a great weekend. Thank you so much and I'll keep in touch with you.
Speaker 2:Okay, all right, all right, bye.