Adeno Thoughts

[mikey]

PICK A OR B AND BE DONE WITH IT

So Tracie,

We can all do the standard 5th grade nitpicking for another 200 pages or you can end this now. I do believe we all have much better things going on than to do this again.

A) I was mislead, here is the "unofficial results" email. (posted with headers) I should of never posted her negative status on my Society page without confirming her status with official results in hand. I made a honest mistake. It will never happen again. I AM SORRY.

B) I lied, she never emailed me the "unofficial results" I made that up to protect her. I trusted her and thought she was a friend. At the time we spoke on the phone, out of respect for her since we had emailed several times & she said she would email me or mail me the results, I honestly thought that she would. She has been beat up enough here so giving her the benefit of the doubt is what I had intended to do until she proved me wrong. I fully expected to receive those results. So oh well. I honestly don't know if she ever tested. Maybe we will never know unless she ever comes out with it. I tried & gave her a way out. It did not work out. There is nothing I can do about it. No one can say that I didn't try.
IT WILL NEVER HAPPEN AGAIN. I AM SORRY.

 

[Dachiu]

Denise is not testing this year. At the time we spoke on the phone, out of respect for her since we had emailed several times & she said she would email me or mail me the results, I honestly thought that she would. She has been beat up enough here so giving her the benefit of the doubt is what I had intended to do until she proved me wrong. I fully expected to receive those results. So oh well. I honestly don't know if she ever tested. Maybe we will never know unless she ever comes out with it. I tried & gave her a way out. It did not work out. There is nothing I can do about it. No one can say that I didn't try. Besides, she never said that her tests were conducted at the U. of Florida anyway. Where did you ever get that from? I wanted to protect her privacy, & she may have tested. If you all harrassed her vet like she claimed, then, personally I don't blame her for not releasing them to me or to anyone else. You all have a way of mobbing people. Tracie

Tracie, you set PATS (yourself) up as an independent/unbiased 3rd party, willing to verify negative AV results for the general public. Many people depended on you to provide them with accurate information concerning the validity of test results belonging to those breeders listed on the PATS website. You, by your own admission above, fabricated and discussed with Tammy negative test results from one of the breeders.
You, as an active, trusted member of the bearded dragon community lied about the verification of another’s results. You were expecting the results - yet you posted on the PATS website that a breeder tested negative - but did so without verification.

You have failed.

PATS now has a new meaning - Pogona Adenovirus Testing Scam.


Although adenovirus is believed to be widespread throughout the captive population, that does not mean that a small-scale negative tested colony cannot be maintained. I think that both sides of the “adeno argument” were actually looking forward to this information - with multiple verified tests to back it up.

The reality is, most dragons are positive - including ours. The theory of adeno-viral exposure means that just 1 positive dragon in a colony = all dragons within that colony have been exposed. They are all considered contaminated - until proven otherwise. There is currently no testing method available which will identify a negative dragon; therefore any dragon that has had direct or indirect contact with a positive tested animal is presumed to be positive. (I say “presume” meaning - to assume as true in the absence of proof to the contrary.)
For us, in order to even entertain the idea of maintaining a negative colony we would have to dispose of all of our animals, burn our cages, throw away all of our bins, lighting equipment, supplements, etc… essentially move our whole facility from our home to elsewhere and pray that we can find long-term, negative tested dragons. It is not going to happen. Certainly not when our animals are healthy and thriving.

On the other hand, we believe it is possible that a small, closed collection may continue to test long-term Av negative. If you have a small colony and are undertaking the challenge of eradicating adenovirus from your collection - we have a proposal for you. This is a serious offer and we have no time and/or patience for games - ALL information will be verified and made available for public perusal.

-- Provide 3 negative EM results (which we will verify) on each of the adult dragons in your colony taken over the course of 6 months to a year. Each animal must be identified for individual sample results. We’d also like to see 1 group sampling of 4-8 week old babies tested with negative results. If 1 EM returns positive results, we will confirm with a PCR to determine if a mistake was possibly made. (+ PCR result means you’re +, - PCR result means continue EM testing.)
-- We will then cover the cost of 3 PCR tests throughout the following year - at intervals of our choice - ‘mid’ and ‘end’ breeding season, when their systems are taxed. 2 PCR fecal samples must be collected by your veterinarian through a cloacal wash. The 3rd PCR is to be collected from the latter clutches of offspring. We do require open communication with the breeder and their veterinarian and will gladly pay the veterinarian for services rendered.

This is not only an opportunity for someone to achieve multiple negative results - both EM and PCR… since in the end, we will all gain some information.

 

[JeffnDes]

You want facts? We all want facts. And I don't have them for you. What I have is my experience and what has worked and what has not worked FOR US. I have never at any time claimed to know more then anyone else, we are normal people with a love for these dragons. Have we made mistakes along the way??? Heck yea we did, but we learned. Will we make more mistakes? Well not if I can help it but I can't predict the future either, I'm sure we will.

We have dragons on two floors in our house now and I can tell you what works upstairs isn't what works downstairs and vice a versa. In the same house we have to have different conditions on different floors. Go figure, this is something I learned the hard way. Our dragons in the basement did awesome, they were always bright eyed and more active then the ones we kept upstairs. But we didn’t notice it until we built a room and moved dragons downstairs. Well months went by and even though we clean our cages very well multiple times a day things were happening and we didn’t notice. Well most people know that almost everything we read is that dragons come from arid regions. Arid meaning dry. Well something that I have really never thought about was humidity until I spoke with some friends. Our dragons upstairs were dehydrating. They were misted a few times a week and fed multiple times daily with very mixed diets, yet they were still dehydrating and having shedding problems. Well with advice from some people we checked downstairs and we were running at about 53% humidity while upstairs we were running about 20%.

Husbandry, this is what husbandry is. It is a very small part in the grand scheme of things but it can have detrimental effects. Because of our ignorance we risked damaging our dragons. But does it change anything that we didn’t know? Of course not, we screwed up and put our animals lives at risk. We listened to people that knew more then we did and we made the changes that we needed to make. Well months or more our dragon upstairs look like a million bucks again.

My question now is this, If I had come on a group asking for help because my dragons upstairs weren't looking 100% like they should, how many people would have asked about our humidity level? If I was a betting man, I would say that I would get pounded with questions weather or not we test for Adeno. If we had lost a dragon during this time I have no doubt that Adeno would have been blamed. Look people things happen and we learn and move forward. Our colony now consists of 40 adult and sub adult dragons. A heck of a lot of things can go wrong quickly. Just like the bacteria in the hornworms that was mentioned earlier. I was asked if I recognized the symptoms, the truth is, No I didn’t. When we did it was to late. We have a fantastic vet that understands our needs, he comes here when and if we need him. He comes here on social visits, he calls if he is stumped on another patient. What happened to our dragons happened so fast it was unbelievable. If I had noticed something a day sooner, would it have changed anything? Possibly, I don't know. One female was in the dirt digging to lay eggs when she was effected (or when we noticed signs), 12 hours later she was gone. Another one ate in the evening, she was also pregnant, the next morning her eyes were sinking in to her head, that night she was gone. The same day we saw the same signs on another gravid girl but we were able to get her to the vet, she died in his office and he then took her and posted her that night. Want to talk about scared? The worst part was we had no idea who was going to be next. When symptoms were shown it was to late. Maybe there were earlier symptoms that we didn’t catch. I could believe that with the first two. Every dragon we had was examined. While this was happening our vet gave us baytril because he didn’t know what it was but he did figure it was bacterial issues. We dosed many dragons in panic. Now again I'll ask, being that Tracie was quick to point out that I was trying to hide something. What would anyone here have done? Our pets were dieing and we were scared to death and had no answers early on. Was I supposed to come on here and beg for help? I have a very qualified Vet who was already on the job.

My point is, I have no doubt that our dragons are positive for Adeno, we lost 4 gravid females and a yearling male plus eggs from other girls that were treated with baytril. Why did it kill these dragons and not all of them? If one or two are positive, they all are positive, they all have it from in direct contact. Maybe their systems were compromised because the girls were all gravid and the one male had literally just come up from brumation. Instead Sandy was so quick to decide that their systems were compromised due to AV. My dragons are healthy and robust. They were poisoned and had compromised systems due to being gravid. Do I have proof? No, but neither does Sandy to support her theory. Maybe things could have ended up differently for our girls, we will never know and as heartbreaking as that was, we're still here.

No one knows everything, we try, we get knocked down, but weather you decide to stay down or get up and move forward is what gives you the power needed to keep moving forward and succeed.

There you have it Sandy. I hope you got what you were looking for.

Jeff

 

[mikey]

01-20-2007, 07:38 PM I am so sorry to hear about your dragons..My heart goes out to you..I had all mine tested a few months ago..All tests came back neg.

Wow,
I wonder if Lynn of Lynn's Bearded Dragons would be interested in your offer? She did test negative, and is a long term, experienced breeder. I don't know how large her colony is though, but might be worth asking her if no one steps forward. It would be nice to see a actual long term study done and posted for all to see. Exciting.....

 

[JeffnDes]

Pogona Adenovirus Testing Scam. LMFAO!!!

You guys are awesome! What an unbelievable offer! They don't get any better then the two of you. I want to personally say Thank You for all you do!

 

[Dennis Hultman]

Let me bring up old blood for explanation as much as I hate it: Denise did not have PCR tests, any samples pulled by Studio City Animal Hospital. SCAH has not sent in one bearded dragon adeno sample...(please, please confirm this) Dr. Stacey (U of FL) was so intrigued with Denise's statement on the forum that they called SCAH. "There is no Denise Latanzi in our database" "No, we do not do that testing at our hospital" Dr. Flanagan/owner/Studio City Animal Hospital.

Call Dr. Stacey or Dr. Jacobson and ask him about his conversation with Dr. Flanagan..he will be happy to speak with you about it. Also, there has been no barrage of phone calls to that hospital as much as one would like to claim, that is a smoke screen. Pick up the phone Tracie, these are professionals who will be happy to speak with you about this and correct false information.

Just to refresh my memory. Didn't she state the tests where done somewhere else? Thanks.

 

[Dachiu]

Jean,

Sure, if you know her please tell her. This offer is open to anyone who breeds on a small scale...

 

[Tere Salazar]

Just to refresh my memory. Didn't she state the tests where done somewhere else? Thanks.

Dennis,

Denise posted the name of her vet hospital as Studio City Animal Hospital, and that her vet was a female. Dr. Flanagan is a man.

Denise at first didn't know the name of the lab that her vet sent the tests to (what normal person would), and once she contacted her vet's office, she reported that her vet told her the tests were sent to Cal Avian Lab.

I may be misremembering this part, but I think she also stated that Cal Avian had outsourced those tests, but she didn't know where.

 

[Tere Salazar]

Edit: I posted that her vet is a female, I think, after several people referred to her vet being Dr. Flanagan.

 

[whiskersmom]

Anyone can call Studio City and find out that they don't do testing in their facility, that is true, but Cal Avian does do PCR testing via private veterinaries. As Tammy has said more then once, make a phone call!!!!

 

[Drache613]

Hello

Hello,

Yes, me again.
Unfortunately, I was not intelligent enough, at the time, to have SAVED all of my damn PM's from Fauna here last May. That is why I cannot provide the "unofficial results".
However, I never did say that she was even breeding, so that does not constitute any sales of any stock. My mistake was being too trusting.
I can also add, that if you do remember, another breeder that has been bashing me was on my site, BeardedWizard, who said he would test. So, on good faith I did put him on my site & said to check back for updates. Well, he broke the terms of agreement & never even attempted to test. I DID remove him. Now, he bashes me. Very professional.
Also, keep in mind, that I DID have a legitimate breeder on my site that DID & STILL DOES test negative & has for 2 years, that I had to remove due to harrassment.
If we are going to get anywhere, we can't simply harrass all of the breeders that I put up on my site. I will not post her results without her permission & at this time I highly doubt that she wants them posted. Now, for statistical purposes, I probably can do that, yes. Not until I run that past her or make some type of chart, etc.
So, I am finding it difficult to put anyone up there now due to those problems.
This is what we ALL want, is answers. When it is admitted that there is a problem, then, we can go from there. That is ALL that I have been asking of people for the last 1 1/2 years but no one would listen.
Now, all of the sudden you offer information? Why has everyone waited? I wouldn't beat people up because they report they are positive. I want to try & help fix the problem so people don't have to go through the heartbreak of losing their beloved pets.
Vickie, thank you for the offer. I will think on it. I am looking into seeing if I could possibly get a grant to help out my clients with their testing.
I do currently have people who are actively testing, & or getting ready to test & in the plans of testing. I believe that I will be able to gather enough data to get some good results. I also am trying to begin working with a testing company in the UK as well.
Vickie, I do resent the fact that you said that I am scammer, that is not true. You don't even know me. I could say the same about you because up until now, you have never admitted having Adeno until you have finally been forced to do so. If we would all just work together, it would make it much much easier. I have absolutely no agenda so I am not a threat to you as I am not in competition with you nor could I ever be in competition with you or even have a desire to do so.
I do have a question for all of you. If those of you who have been breeding for 10+ years have known you have had a problem before now, why did you wait so long to address it, instead of trying to fix it? Why didn't anyone else before me try to start a similiar type of society to help out, before it got to this point?
Just wondering.

Thanks Tere, Sandy, Sherri!! I am very appreciate of your efforts. I just thought I should check in.


Tracie

 

[JeffnDes]

Hi Tracie,

I still don't think you get it. Animals were coming in to the country with it, animals in the wild have it, it is not concevable to think that it could ever be non existant. It has probably been around as long as the dragons have been around but has not been found until recent years. Is that so hard to imagine? I don't know, do you? Maybe I'm wrong and my thinking on this is off. If this is the case, how could something we didnt know about until fairly recent years ever be contained?

Jeff

 

[Dachiu]

I am not going to repeat myself over our opinions of adenovirus and its prevalence in the captive population. ((If you would like to read the details, click my username and ’view all posts’.)) Why in the world would we consider ourselves exempt from having it?

We have not been “forced” into anything. We have posted plenty of information in the past regarding adenovirus - Example - If you are going to test, test more than once over a period of time. What gets repeated is that we are against testing. We are tired of the misinformation that is being circulated around. The blame, the symptoms, the lies, the rumors that we are ‘after’ those who test - its all crap.

We are not trying to establish negative colonies - we (and I’m sure many others) would like to see if a small colony, tested properly, can maintain a negative status over a period of time. That’s all.
I’m not intentionally trying to be rude Tracie, but there is truly nothing for you to think on. Our offer is open to all small scale breeders and their veterinarians who are willing to participate.

 

[mikey]

Hello,

Yes, me again.
Unfortunately, I was not intelligent enough, at the time, to have SAVED all of my damn PM's from Fauna here last May. That is why I cannot provide the "unofficial results".

Tracie

Maybe Tere can produce it since she seems to have access to PM's exchanges between you and Denise somehow. Anyway I honestly, deep down don't believe you. I pick B, as this was your 1st response and the most truthfully sounding you have been.

B) I lied, she never emailed me the "unofficial results" I made that up to protect her. I trusted her and thought she was a friend. At the time we spoke on the phone, out of respect for her since we had emailed several times & she said she would email me or mail me the results, I honestly thought that she would. She has been beat up enough here so giving her the benefit of the doubt is what I had intended to do until she proved me wrong. I fully expected to receive those results. So oh well. I honestly don't know if she ever tested. Maybe we will never know unless she ever comes out with it. I tried & gave her a way out. It did not work out. There is nothing I can do about it. No one can say that I didn't try.

Vickie, thank you for the offer. I will think on it.

Tracie

Did I miss something, what did she offer you?

 

[draggintails]

This was last year after Denise's post:

Dr. Flanagan is the owner of Studio City Animal Hospital, he said they have not submitted a sample of any kind for bearded dragon AV to be sent out for testing. He spoke to all of his employees and said none of his employees pulled a sample for bearded dragon AV to be sent out. Dr. Flanagan is also the reptile specialist..he said his hospital has not taken a sample for this test period and had never been asked to, but if he were that he would send the sample to U of FL. Their email address: [email protected]

Dr. Flanagan said Denise is not a client, she is not in the database, he called in Darren the hospital manager to go back through records and she was not a client.

Another poster from that old thread Shannon from Bar None Reptiles was the person who thought CA Avian might do AV testing not Denise, Denise never mentioned this.

However, it was researched...CA Avian said that they do not do bearded dragon AV testing at their facility. They have never even received a sample if they did it would have to be sent to their outsource lab which is Veterinary Molecular Diagnostics in Ohio (www.vmd.com) Dr. Wellahan (assoc. of U of FL) did his inhouse research for the 2007 symposium here and no Denise did not test here. Sarah at VMD said she had not received any samples from outside Ohio for bearded dragon AV, nothing from CA Avian. VMD is a lab that is fully set up to receive samples for PCR testing at this time.

At the time Denise posted her results, the only PCR lab operating and accepting outside samples was U of FL.

 

[Tere Salazar]

But this isn't all about Denise, huh?

Hey, Sherri, care to post what you were told today by Cal Avian?

 

[pscaulkins]

Jeff, I only asked for evidence because it was asked of us. I just want to thank you for sharing your information. People can learn from other peoples experiences. You don't have to be a scientist to have valid information.

 

[whiskersmom]

This was last year after Denise's post:

Dr. Flanagan is the owner of Studio City Animal Hospital, he said they have not submitted a sample of any kind for bearded dragon AV to be sent out for testing. He spoke to all of his employees and said none of his employees pulled a sample for bearded dragon AV to be sent out. Dr. Flanagan is also the reptile specialist..he said his hospital has not taken a sample for this test period and had never been asked to, but if he were that he would send the sample to U of FL. Their email address: [email protected]

I called them today and yes, they told me basically the same thing. Then I called Cal Avian and talked to an extremely rude man. I asked him if they did testing of bearded dragons for AV? He said "Who told you to call here?" Being unprepared for that response, I fibbed and said my vet. He then said "We do testing only through veterinarians." And he pretty much hung up the phone on me. Not a pleasant individual. I don't recommend calling him anytime soon.

 

[whiskersmom]

You want facts? We all want facts. And I don't have them for you. What I have is my experience and what has worked and what has not worked FOR US. I have never at any time claimed to know more then anyone else, we are normal people with a love for these dragons. Have we made mistakes along the way??? Heck yea we did, but we learned. Will we make more mistakes? Well not if I can help it but I can't predict the future either, I'm sure we will.

We have dragons on two floors in our house now and I can tell you what works upstairs isn't what works downstairs and vice a versa. In the same house we have to have different conditions on different floors. Go figure, this is something I learned the hard way. Our dragons in the basement did awesome, they were always bright eyed and more active then the ones we kept upstairs. But we didn’t notice it until we built a room and moved dragons downstairs. Well months went by and even though we clean our cages very well multiple times a day things were happening and we didn’t notice. Well most people know that almost everything we read is that dragons come from arid regions. Arid meaning dry. Well something that I have really never thought about was humidity until I spoke with some friends. Our dragons upstairs were dehydrating. They were misted a few times a week and fed multiple times daily with very mixed diets, yet they were still dehydrating and having shedding problems. Well with advice from some people we checked downstairs and we were running at about 53% humidity while upstairs we were running about 20%.

Husbandry, this is what husbandry is. It is a very small part in the grand scheme of things but it can have detrimental effects. Because of our ignorance we risked damaging our dragons. But does it change anything that we didn’t know? Of course not, we screwed up and put our animals lives at risk. We listened to people that knew more then we did and we made the changes that we needed to make. Well months or more our dragon upstairs look like a million bucks again.

My question now is this, If I had come on a group asking for help because my dragons upstairs weren't looking 100% like they should, how many people would have asked about our humidity level? If I was a betting man, I would say that I would get pounded with questions weather or not we test for Adeno. If we had lost a dragon during this time I have no doubt that Adeno would have been blamed. Look people things happen and we learn and move forward. Our colony now consists of 40 adult and sub adult dragons. A heck of a lot of things can go wrong quickly. Just like the bacteria in the hornworms that was mentioned earlier. I was asked if I recognized the symptoms, the truth is, No I didn’t. When we did it was to late. We have a fantastic vet that understands our needs, he comes here when and if we need him. He comes here on social visits, he calls if he is stumped on another patient. What happened to our dragons happened so fast it was unbelievable. If I had noticed something a day sooner, would it have changed anything? Possibly, I don't know. One female was in the dirt digging to lay eggs when she was effected (or when we noticed signs), 12 hours later she was gone. Another one ate in the evening, she was also pregnant, the next morning her eyes were sinking in to her head, that night she was gone. The same day we saw the same signs on another gravid girl but we were able to get her to the vet, she died in his office and he then took her and posted her that night. Want to talk about scared? The worst part was we had no idea who was going to be next. When symptoms were shown it was to late. Maybe there were earlier symptoms that we didn’t catch. I could believe that with the first two. Every dragon we had was examined. While this was happening our vet gave us baytril because he didn’t know what it was but he did figure it was bacterial issues. We dosed many dragons in panic. Now again I'll ask, being that Tracie was quick to point out that I was trying to hide something. What would anyone here have done? Our pets were dieing and we were scared to death and had no answers early on. Was I supposed to come on here and beg for help? I have a very qualified Vet who was already on the job.

My point is, I have no doubt that our dragons are positive for Adeno, we lost 4 gravid females and a yearling male plus eggs from other girls that were treated with baytril. Why did it kill these dragons and not all of them? If one or two are positive, they all are positive, they all have it from in direct contact. Maybe their systems were compromised because the girls were all gravid and the one male had literally just come up from brumation. Instead Sandy was so quick to decide that their systems were compromised due to AV. My dragons are healthy and robust. They were poisoned and had compromised systems due to being gravid. Do I have proof? No, but neither does Sandy to support her theory. Maybe things could have ended up differently for our girls, we will never know and as heartbreaking as that was, we're still here.

No one knows everything, we try, we get knocked down, but weather you decide to stay down or get up and move forward is what gives you the power needed to keep moving forward and succeed.

There you have it Sandy. I hope you got what you were looking for.

Jeff

I just wanted to say that I found this to be a very informative and logical post.

Thank you.

I have to say that I am way out of my league here. I read a post by Jeff or Tammy and now Vickie and I'm torn. I've always wanted to believe that AV is not something all beardies carry but I'm really starting to wonder now. There seems to be so much evidence that points to that conclusion.

I'm sorry if I've let anyone down, but I've always been about the animal.......

Vickie, that is a wonderful step in the right direction in getting some answers. I hope you have some takers....I'd volunteer but I only have 2 and they aren't breeders.

 

[Drache613]

Hello

Hello,

Sherri, what did you find out at Cal Avian??
Vickie, that is fine, trying to establish negative colonies over time, is a great goal. I already have one breeder who has accomplished that for 2 years now. I believe that it can be done. Testing has been done 2 times per year for 2 years now.
I would definitely like to see it happen more. I just do not believe that they all have it, even in the wild. All we have is the one testing study that is it. That is in captivity. We do not have any testing studies for wild dragons, so assuming that all wild dragons have it is kind of like assuming all wild dogs would have parvo.
I believe it does happen in the wild, just due to disease of animals that will happen in nature, definitely. I just do not believe it occurs in the magnitude that we have allowed it to happen here in captivity, that's all.
I think it is our responsiblity as keepers, hobbyists, & breeders to do what we can to try & get it on a smaller scale. Too many dragons are poor doers anymore, & it is sad.
I started this project & I will continue it by collecting tests & data. If any data is going to be viewed, it is going to be viewed and gathered by me. I have no agenda since I am not a breeder I have nothing to lose or gain. The data does not need to be scattered at a million different places where it can easily be corrupted or lost. I have already gotten my form approved through U. of Illinois legal department & Lou Ann is very cooperative as well. All we need is for people to begin testing & that is all I have asked for over & over. That is the only way to get answers!
So, no problem at all. You know of anyone who "claims" that they have negatives, send them my way, & we can get them to testing. My requirements on pats are that they are to test 2 times per year, no exceptions. I think that is fair, financially. I would most definitely want to move toward PCR in conjunction with EM on negative test subjects, over time.
I am all for getting help. I have no problem with that. I just want it done & with someone who is not looking to have any type of agenda. Fair enough I think.
I am just wondering why this has not been attempted before??


Tracie