Treating for worms?

[AdamsFamilyFarm]

I had someone come look at our stock to help us get ready for a show. It will be our first show so we need all the help we can get. She mentioned that they might have worms. How do you treat them and can you treat while pregnant?

[wofarm]

Worm meds are poison, poison stresses animals. get some analysis done on stool samples before you jump into anything. What was their reasoning that your animals had parasites?

[budwpm]

Squash and pumpkin seeds are poison?

I think wofarm was referring to deworming medications.

[AdamsFamilyFarm]

Something about the way the spine felt. She said she was told that was a sign of worms. She suggested I wait until she kindles and I have weened the kits before treating with ivermectin. She has raised show rabbits for 10 years and it has worked for her in the past.

[wofarm]

I was, as I said, meds. How effacacious do you believe seeds to be? Whuich worms do yopur rabbits have? which worms do the seeds have their effect upon?

I fed squash/pumpkin seeds to my poultry and still discovered worms but the load was small enuff to not be a problem.

[budwpm]

I wondered how seeds were going to be a cure all to worms. Is there any good websites pertaining to worms and what kills which type of worm?

[wofarm]

I never looked it up but i, as others , heard they were used as anthelmintics years ago. I fed them to cattle too. Then used Ivermec pour on. I eat lots of roasted punkin seeds, love em, dont think I have worms either!

[Wisconsin Ann]

A little googling will bring up quite bit of information on them. The RAW seeds of the pumpkin (and other squash and melons) contain an amino acid cucurbitin. Cucurbitin paralyzes tapeworms and roundworms. The worm is paralyzed, can't attach to the intestinal tract or stomach, and is flushed out with the waste.

Since worms have a (approx) 20 day cycle of life/eggs/hatch, you treat the animal (any ruminant) for 30 days to be sure. Some sites say to feed something that will cause diarhea to help the "flushing of the system".

Seeds should be ground freshly and added to some feed. Although with rabbits, I suppose the rabbit grinds it quite nicely as it eats?

[Niomi]

My rabbits had tapeworm before. I coated their pellets with food grade diatomaceous earth, and that took care of the problem. I noticed a decrease in tapeworm in their feces within a week, but kept up with the treatment for a couple of months.

[Devoville]

Worms can cause a heck of a lot of stress on an animal. The breeder was refering to the rabbits "flesh condition" The spines may have been too noticeable despite a large /pot belly area. Worms can kill period.They also "eat up" all that nutrition you are feeding your rabbits causing a loss of feed conversion and loss of money! Most meds. are based on plants anyways.

[wofarm]

Another consideration for the knobby spine and potty belly is breeding qualities. potty bellies can be caused by improper feeds and a lack of selection pressure for good solid type. the knobby spine may be also a breeding problem, long vertabrae. The animals may in fact have a parasite problem but also may need some breeding attention as well as feed upgrades. just saying..

[AdamsFamilyFarm]

I got some pumpkin seeds and will give them to her. How many should I be giving her? I'll treat her with the ivomectin after I wean the kits. She comes from very good stock. These animals are bred to show for meat pens. I can't imagine the person I got them from keeping her if there was ANY problem. I'll try treating her and see what happens. Other than that, she said they were all excellent stock. She said they worked 10 years to get the quality we were basically given.

[Devoville]

Spines are naturally knobby, its the flesh thats covering them thats in question. I have no idea how many pumpkin seeds will do the trick because every variety is different as to how much cucurbitin is present in each individual seed shell. Thats why I use the measured amount found in ivermectin.yes there are many reasons a rabbit is down in condition, the 2 most notable are, on a litter and worm infestation. Yes sometimes genetically its hard to get good condition, but in this case the rabbits have been genetically selected to compete in meat pens, so i don't think its breeding.
anyways here is a link to a description of the main ingredient of ivermectin: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/en...&list_uids=189
this link also explains ivermectin:http://www.rxlist.com/stromectol-drug.htm

[AdamsFamilyFarm]

Thanks!