Rattlesnake Vaccine

[Guest BlackandBrindle]

Does anyone know anything about it and how it works, or even IF it works?

[GreytNut]

I asked my vet about it once (back in SoCal) and he said it was still largely experimental, hadn't been proven effective and that he refused to use his patients as guinea pigs.

 

That was 3 years ago, but I haven't heard anything more about it since then, nor do I know any vets who offer it.

[Hubcitypam]

My vet has a drug company poster in one of the waiting rooms. I'll ask him when I tak Poodlum in for a glucose test a week from Monday. I want to think everything I've heard was inconclusive.

 

 

[Guest Shermanator]

I like the concept, but don't trust it yet. The rattlers are bad this year, a little south of Phoenix in more of the rural areas, a friend's dog was but by one. The vet actually drove out and my friend drove out to meet halfway to get the dog the antidote. Fortunately the pup made it, but it was touch and go for a while. While we are in a housing development, we are surrounded by reservation and farming fields. We're going to be getting 1 or 2 snake bite kits, just in case, for both the dogs, and us, too.

[Guest greybookends]

Please tell me that this is an in general question and that no one has actually been bitten!

[CaliforniaGreys]

My vet has a drug company poster in one of the waiting rooms. I'll ask him when I tak Poodlum in for a glucose test a week from Monday. I want to think everything I've heard was inconclusive.

 

My vet also has a poster in the waiting room.

Last year I went to the e-vet with a friend whose dog had been injured and a woman came in with her lab who had been bitten. I had never seen anything like it, that boy's head was so swollen you couldn't tell what breed of dog he was.

They transported him to a vet in Palm Desert who had the vaccine but I never heard the outcome, but they were using it.

I didn't understand why they transported the dog vs the drug, but there must have been a reason

[Guest Energy11]

From what I hear, the vaccine is safe. My good friend in Florida, lives in the "boonies," and has lots of poisonous snakes. Her two greys get the vaccine ... no obvious problems or side effects.

 

They get two shots, two weeks apart, and then, a booster every year. It protects against pit vipers, not coral snakes, which have a totally different toxin.

 

If your dogs are vaccinated, of course you still have to go right to the vet, BUT, they say, it minimizes the effect of the bite, and it can save their lives. I was going to give it to mine when we moved, but, their pens are inspected before they go out, and when we walk, it is on a moved path ONLY, and we go ahead of them.

 

For anyone living in an area with venemous snakes, whose dogs have free-run of the area, I'd highly suggest it. http://www.redrockbiologics.com/FAQ.html

[Guest BlackandBrindle]

No one has been bitten, I was discussing it with a friend the other week and just wondered if there was more information on it.

 

Another friend did the Colorado River Toad training on her dogs (poodles) and was thinking about the snake training as well. If the vaccine works, I'll forward the info to her because I hate the idea of the snake/toad training.

[Guest BlackandBrindle]

double post

 

 

Edited May 28, 2010 by BlackandBrindle

[Anne]

My vet uses it and says that it works VERY well as she's had some dogs bitten by rattlers who have had the shot and survived without a whole lot of vet care, though any snake bite needs to be seen by a vet.

A friends 2 greyhounds had the vaccine several years in a row and did not have any reaction to it at all and they were geriatric dogs.

 

The mohaves this year are very bad and very aggressive. We did lose a dog in this area (not a greyhound and not mine) who had had the vaccine and it didn't really seem to help much. But Mohaves are very nasty snakes with nasty nasty bites.

[Guest greyarea]

Lucy (9) and Molly (7) have both been on the vaccine for a couple of years, now, with no adverse effects or reactions. We're located in Central Fl and I see pigmy rattlers in our yard more often than I'd like. We also have Eastern diamondbacks in the area, but not in our neighborhood (too wet, apparently).

Back in Jan '08, I contacted Red Rock Biologics (info@redrockbiologics.com) to ask about the pigmy. Here's their reply:

"The Crotalus Atrox Toxoid vaccine was developed against the venom components in the western diamondback venom. Because there are similarities between components in different venoms, we also see protection with this vaccine against the timber, prairie, northern and southern pacific, great basin and pigmy rattlesnakes, the sidewinder, the massasauga (Sistrurus catenatus, southern enclave), the copperhead and limited against the eastern diamondback. There is no protection against the venoms from the water moccasin (cottonmouth) or the neurotoxins in Mojave Green rattlesnakes or coral snakes."

 

As noted previously, a bite still requires vet attention - just provides some protection and peace of mind.

 

 

[Guest kydie]

I too asked the vet about this vaccine, was told it is a weakened form of venome,and sometimes it works and some times not so much never got it as we do have rattlers in our area, but few and far between on our ground, the hunters went through a snake averion program, and DH tests them on it each year, although I think I will check on this again