Free Republic
Browse · Search
Bloggers & Personal
Topics · Post Article

To: Impy
Squirrels almost never have rabies. True, any warm-blooded animal is susceptible to rabies, but squirrels are seldom, if ever, found to be rabid. I say “if ever” because the last time I checked I couldn't find a case of a squirrel with rabies. It's been a few years and it could have changed since then, but at the time I researched it pretty carefully. I was the PA at a rural clinic with no doctors in the entire four county area and we had a gentleman sent to us by a nearby teaching hospital to receive a series of rabies shots and I came across that interesting fact. Dogs do it, cats do it, even pigs do it, but I could find nary a reported case of a squirrel with rabies.

Maybe someone here is more up to date in the area of rabies and can correct me.

Rabid animals seldom show the determination described by this account.

Anyone?

12 posted on 07/25/2009 11:16:55 PM PDT by jwparkerjr (God Bless America!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies ]


To: jwparkerjr

Can I get rabies from a squirrel or a mouse?

Squirrels, mice, and other small rodents have only very rarely been found to have rabies, and have never been known to transmit rabies to humans or other animals. In general, postexposure treatment is not recommended after a bite from one of these animals unless it is unusually vicious or appears obviously ill. Groundhogs are the only rodents that are likely to be infected with rabies virus in areas where raccoons are commonly found to be rabid.


16 posted on 07/25/2009 11:28:28 PM PDT by free me (Sarah Palin 2012? You Betcha!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 12 | View Replies ]

To: jwparkerjr
Anyone?

Here ya go:

Rabid Squirrel case

24 posted on 07/26/2009 1:08:37 AM PDT by Swordmaker (remember, the proper pronunciation of IE is "AAAAIIIIIEEEEEEE!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 12 | View Replies ]

To: jwparkerjr; shibumi

You are correct.

Even if one *did* survive the attack of a rabid animal, their metabolisms are *so* high that the virus would -quickly- incapacitate them and kill them.

They’d be in no shape to be “stalking and attacking” anything else.

The idiots in the local city park killed ‘all the rabid squirrels’ one year due to the complaint of one hysterical woman.

She claimed it was “aggressive and repeatedly ran at her” as she sat on a park bench.

They *all* did that because they were used to people feeding them the peanuts the park *sold* for that very purpose and encouraged the feeding, thereof and the squirrel was frustrated that she had no nuts.

[no entendre’ intended....maybe]

One year, before they banned dogs in the park, a surly squirrel jumped up on my knee, screeching...with my Doberman sitting right there with me.

I’d shove it off...it’d jump back on.

Finally I gave up and bought it some peanuts.

It watched me open the cello package and very gently took them from my hand and ran up a tree.

They have mastered the art of blackmail, apparently.


30 posted on 07/26/2009 2:06:56 AM PDT by Salamander (Cursed with Second Sight.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 12 | View Replies ]

To: jwparkerjr

That’s because squirrels are so small, they rarely survive being bitten by a rabid animal and die in the attack. That’s my hypothesis anyway.


48 posted on 07/26/2009 11:14:57 AM PDT by HamiltonJay
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 12 | View Replies ]

Free Republic
Browse · Search
Bloggers & Personal
Topics · Post Article


FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson