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Info Erik Strait, aka Eriks Reptiles, Parasites and Misrepresentation

The problem with the lungworm theory is that almost nobody knows what they look like. I tried to find pictures and videos for about an hour this morning, to no avail. Do we have any GOOD pictures of the maggots/lungworms that came out of that guentheri? No. Heck, we don't even have any good video of them. I'd like for anybody who is so sure that know what they are to share WHY they know that... I mean details of the characteristics seen in those videos that make them so positive.
I'm not being confrontational, I'm being curious. I can't tell jack diddly from the videos, they're not very clear at all.

The vet didn't see the worms, went off the information given by the buyer and said "no way" are they maggots. All the evidence is destroyed except for a few short videos. Get your pitchforks...



The whole thing's just bogus, IMO. I read this thread for a while before deciding to post, but then jumped in because of the genus involved. I almost feel like it's an offsetting penalty-

Seller- doesn't treat his animals for parasites and then mixes CB and WC. I have WC and CB together, but I've quarantined all my animals and done fecals on them and still do random fecals from time to time. The difference is I'm KEEPING mine, not selling them as parasite cleared CB animals. To sell them after mixing them together is bad practice.

Buyer- gecko dies, disposes of all evidence that could prove what the worms are, but somehow there is "no way" they're maggots? Please, if anything like this ever happens again do us all a favor and take a decent up close picture and save a few of them. And I too would like to know what's up with all the other animals you got from him? Have they had fecals done? If one out of the five was so heavily infested with parasites that the animal died and the worms came out the mouth then I'd think it likely the other animals have the same parasite. Have they been tested? I don't guess you thought to get a fecal done on the dead animal? They can do that you know... you already had the gecko cut open.
 
I haven't posted because no one seems to read what I post anyway, it just opens up another round of "Shame on you" and "You shouldn't have animals". For starters, I never thought the worms crawling out were maggots, I thought they were some sort of lung worm, which creeped me out because they were on my hands, and then crawling all over the gloves when I was doing the necropsy. If you do a search, lung worms are one of the few reptilian parasites that can infect humans. I discarded the remains because it was Saturday afternoon, my vet closes at 2pm, and does not open again until Monday. There was no way in hell I was going to put squirmy, live, possibly infectious worms in my refrigerator over the weekend. At the time I wasn't that concerned anyway, because no matter what kind of worm, the treatment and medication is all the same. I spoke at length with Dr. Greek last week about the gecko, and he again said it couldn't have been maggots in that freshly dead of an animal unless it somehow had a sore that went all the way through it's side into the chest cavity. Even then he said in all his years of treating reptiles, any time he has seen maggots in a sore they have been the short, fat kind, not the skinny long worms I found. He said when he used to do necropsies on panther chameleons fresh from Madagascar back in the early 90's, they would cut them open and they looked like they were full of spaghetti, they were so packed full of worms in the chest cavity. I also spoke with a gecko breeder that used to unpack the Madagascar shipments with Erik's importer. He said nothing was ever treated, just uncrated and sent out to the buyers. I'm trying to get him to post here, but given the treatment I have received, it's going to be rather difficult. I also spoke to Dr. Greek about importers treating shipments, and he said he doesn't see it being done beyond a shotgun dose of Panacur, since the importers would have to hold and treat the animals for 6 weeks to do a full, effective treatment round of Panacur. I have tried to respond to any respectfully asked questions of me, I'm sorry if I missed any.
 
I'm not trying to intentionally rake you over the coals here. I just think you made some mistakes that could have answered many questions here. I do hear you and understand how you could have acted the way you did. But you could have used a zippie and put them in the freezer even. They'd still be pretty in tact come Monday either way. The question I'd like answered is- have you had the other geckos tested for parasites? If so, what was the result?
 
I've always been told not to put animals in the freezer, the whole destruction of cells thing. Not sure if that would affect parasites, but the freezer never even crossed my mind. If I had had some formaldehyde or something like that on hand, I might have tried preserving them, but I didn't like the thought of them alive in the refrigerator. I had my vet pull all my fecal records for the past year while I was there, I had the two ltc pairs of sikorae, one from Erik and one from someone local, both which had Coccidea, one pair also had flagellates (acquired and tested at different times, both now treated). My namib web foots are cb and came back clean, my farmed helmeteds came back positive for flagellates and were treated with Flagyl. Oh, and the reason I didn't take the gecko to the vet, he usually doesn't have me bring my animals in unless needed for xrays or for something else I can't do at home, he has the same deal with all local breeders and pet stores. He has been trying to get me to do my own fecals for months, which now with this I'm glad I didn't, pretty sure that would have come under fire. I bring my fecals in, get them tested, tell them the weight of the animal, and they give me the meds. He said the worms might have shown up on a fecal, if the animal coughs them up and then somehow swallows them they will show up in the feces, but otherwise worms located in the chest cavity will not show. I've since treated everything with a full round of Panacur to be on the safe side. As for me feeling under attack, that wasn't directed at you Kevin, you've been rather fair I think.
 
I haven't seen a live lungworm, but nematodes all have basically the same build. I've seen more than enough live nematodes to know those weren't lungworms.
 
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