Illness/Sickness: Salamandra respiratory problem?

[tdimler]

I've got a group of adult S. s. gallaica exhibiting the following symptoms:

Clear discharge from the nose
Semi-labored breathing/gasping

These are animals that have been with me for a couple years and perfectly healthy. They go off feed for a couple weeks and then start showing these signs. Their throat starts to look swollen and if you press on it mucous/bubbles come out their nostrils. Towards the later stages their head starts to get swollen in addition to their throat. I am thinking it is some sort of respiratory problem or bacterial infection. I have separated them out and am keeping them as dry as I can and some show slight improvement. Any ideas or suggestions? Is there any antibiotic that I could use?

Travis

 

[herpvet]

I've got a group of adult S. s. gallaica exhibiting the following symptoms:

Clear discharge from the nose
Semi-labored breathing/gasping

These are animals that have been with me for a couple years and perfectly healthy. They go off feed for a couple weeks and then start showing these signs. Their throat starts to look swollen and if you press on it mucous/bubbles come out their nostrils. Towards the later stages their head starts to get swollen in addition to their throat. I am thinking it is some sort of respiratory problem or bacterial infection. I have separated them out and am keeping them as dry as I can and some show slight improvement. Any ideas or suggestions? Is there any antibiotic that I could use?

Travis

Hello Travis,

I would suggest that you need to get these animals to a vet if possible. It does sound like an infection is developing, and tests would be necessary to try to determine likely involved pathogens (bacterial/fungal/viral) so that appropriate treatment can be used. Simply starting antibiotics may or may not work, but testing gives the best chance of choosing an appropriate treatment, as well as possibly giving an indication of likely source.

Having said that, it is always worth thinking very carefully about any change in your set-up (including in the room they are in) that could possibly be either directly irritating their respiratory system, or simply stressing them enough to drop their immunity, allowing an opportunistic pathogen to take hold.

The vet will probably want a lot more information about your set-up, history of animal additions, source and pretreatment of any enclosure substrate and furnishings which might help in determining a cause/source of the problem. It may be worth posting more details here for suggestions also on that.

Hope this helps,

Bruce

 

[tdimler]

Hello Travis,

I would suggest that you need to get these animals to a vet if possible. It does sound like an infection is developing, and tests would be necessary to try to determine likely involved pathogens (bacterial/fungal/viral) so that appropriate treatment can be used. Simply starting antibiotics may or may not work, but testing gives the best chance of choosing an appropriate treatment, as well as possibly giving an indication of likely source.

Having said that, it is always worth thinking very carefully about any change in your set-up (including in the room they are in) that could possibly be either directly irritating their respiratory system, or simply stressing them enough to drop their immunity, allowing an opportunistic pathogen to take hold.

The vet will probably want a lot more information about your set-up, history of animal additions, source and pretreatment of any enclosure substrate and furnishings which might help in determining a cause/source of the problem. It may be worth posting more details here for suggestions also on that.

Hope this helps,

Bruce

Bruce,

Thanks for the thoughts. I think a veterinarian is out of the question. There isn't a vet in my area that even knows what a salamander is much less how to treat it. I know a shotgun approach to treatment isn't the best way but is sometimes the only way. I feel confident in my husbandry, but may have been keeping these particular animals a bit too moist and/or crowded. Do you have any suggestions as to a treatment to try?

Travis

 

[herpvet]

Bruce,

Thanks for the thoughts. I think a veterinarian is out of the question. There isn't a vet in my area that even knows what a salamander is much less how to treat it. I know a shotgun approach to treatment isn't the best way but is sometimes the only way. I feel confident in my husbandry, but may have been keeping these particular animals a bit too moist and/or crowded. Do you have any suggestions as to a treatment to try?

Travis

Hello Travis,

For shotgun treatment I would tend to go for a combination of a fluoroquinolone (enrofloxacin or marbofloxacin) and ceftazidime, although that' s based partly on sensitivity results I tend to get over here, where resistance to these two is generally quite low - it may different in the US. The spectrum from this combination is pretty good, toxicity generally low and tissue distribution good.

However, obviously that depends on what you have available. Although less ideal than a vet experienced with amphibians, a local vet should be able to liaise with a more experienced vet elsewhere in the country though?

Best wishes,

Bruce.

 

[SludgeMunkey]

I've got a group of adult S. s. gallaica exhibiting the following symptoms:

Clear discharge from the nose
Semi-labored breathing/gasping

These are animals that have been with me for a couple years and perfectly healthy. They go off feed for a couple weeks and then start showing these signs. Their throat starts to look swollen and if you press on it mucous/bubbles come out their nostrils. Towards the later stages their head starts to get swollen in addition to their throat. I am thinking it is some sort of respiratory problem or bacterial infection. I have separated them out and am keeping them as dry as I can and some show slight improvement. Any ideas or suggestions? Is there any antibiotic that I could use?

Travis

Did I misunderstand your post? Is this the first time it has happened, or does it happen every so often?

 

[tdimler]

Did I misunderstand your post? Is this the first time it has happened, or does it happen every so often?

This is the first time I have ever had this happen.

Travis

 

[Ingo]

AW: Salamandra respiratory problem?

Hello Travis,

you don`t have any herpetological Institution around??
Or maybe a Zoo??
The vets there are mostly experienced with other animals then dog, cat and mouse.

greetings and good luck
Ingo V.