Maggot?

[nose_twitch]

When I was a kid, we lived in the High Desert inCalifornia. I had two rabbits, both rescue animals, and I fell in love with both of them, especially a white mix I named Thumper. One day I noticed a hole in his back. I was about 10 years old, and my mom said we couldn't afford to take him to a vet, so we took him to a feed store where a guy told us it looked like he had a giant maggot in him. I still to this day don't know if that was really what it was. Anyway, my mom gave me hydrogen peroxide and some tweezers, and after about two hours of careful prying,I fished out a huge maggot-like worm. Poor Thumper was so good, and I gave him a baby carrot and some apples after that. For the next twoweeks I poured hydrogen peroxide in hishole until it closed up. He lived for another 7 years, happy as can be!

 

[rabbitluvr04]

that is really weird and scarey.:shock:

 

[nose_twitch]

Yeah, I'm just glad that I'm an adult now and can afford to take my rabbit to the vet if I ever have to!

 

[bunnydude]

Yikes!

 

[naturestee]

That's called "fly strike." I'm glad you were able to get it out and disinfect the wound- it can be fatal.

As a side note, many members here recommend adding a small amount ofpure vanilla extract to the water. It seems to deterflies. I have yet to try this, as my rabbits are indoors andone is very picky. I don't want to discourage her fromdrinking water!

 

[nose_twitch]

Wow, now I finally know what it was.Maybe I'll put some vanilla extract in my bunny's water, although he'sinside about half of the day. What's the proportion ofvanilla to water?

 

[bunnydude]

Buck Jones had reccomended 1 teaspoon to one gallon in the cheat sheet for rabbit care
http://rabbitsonline.net/view_topic.php?id=3005&forum_id=1

 

[naturestee]

I *think* you are supposed to add enough toslightly color the water. I would keep a second water sourceavailable in case they don't like it, as a few rabbits won't.Most rabbits like the taste and will actually drink more water becauseof the vanilla.

Bunnydude and I posted at the same time.

 

[pamnock]

naturestee wrote:

That's called "fly strike." I'm glad you were ableto get it out and disinfect the wound- it can be fatal.

It's actually a cuterebralarvae (warble). Differentfrom fly strike (blow flies) which iswhen flies lay eggsaround the dirty bum area or in wounds and the maggots feed on therabbit's flesh:

Warbles:

http://cal.vet.upenn.edu/dxendopar/parasitepages/unknown/cutebra.html

Flystrike: http://www.rabbit.org/journal/2-12/fly-strike.html

Either can be a risk to the animal's health.

Pam

 

[pamnock]

Vanilla in the water will not deter botflies and will not prevent flystrike.

Pam

 

[nose_twitch]

Thanks for your tips. It makes sensethat Thumper got the "maggot" in the hot weather, as there are moreflies during the summer. I think I'm going to try addinganother crock to JJ's porch with the vanilla extract in it, so he canchoose from both. It's a wonder that the vanilla doesn'tATTRACT flies. I'll never understand nature.

 

[Starlight Rabbitry]

Maggots are small looking, little white grossthings. They are about the size of a grain of rice.If yours was bigger, I think you had a bot fly.

 

[nose_twitch]

Must have been a bot fly because it was huge. Poor rabbit. I still get sad when I think about it.

 

[Mr. Stee]

He survived and lived a long happy life becauseof your heroic actions (even if you didn't take him to the vet, you didwhat I would guess the vet would have done anyways). There isnothing that should make you feel bad. You were good tohim. Its the flies that are evil.

 

[MeatHeadsDaddy]

not to get off topic here, ( I seem to be sayingthat a lot lately ), When we lived in our last apartment, we had justgotten these beautiful new potholders. One day we were eatingdinner and we saw something fuzzy and white on it, so I go over andgrab it and tried to get it off with my fingernail. It wasntbudgin'. So I got a knife and tried to scrape it off and loand behold, out comes the biggest maggot I have ever seen in mylife. Now my question here is this, We never ever had abreakout of maggots or flies. This was one single maggot andit was bigger than I ever thought they could get. Plus, itwas inside like a little cocoon of webbing. Would that be amaggot or is that like something you are talking about here.

Just FYI, we threw the potholder out. I couldn't even bear to look at it.

 

[pamnock]

Most likely a moth larva. Some of thelarvae resemble maggots and moth larva spin web cocoons. (Fly pupaeform hard shells).

Moth larva

Pam

 

[MeatHeadsDaddy]

yeah that pretty much looks like it. I used to like moths, I don't think I do anymore.

 

[dootsmom]

Last Sunday, a nice, little, old lady that rescues cats delivered 2 buns. The black one
seemed to have a small bite on his back...I put a little anti-biotic on it and completely
forgot about it (I now have 38 rabbits :foreheadsmack. As Iwas petting her last night, I realized that she now had a lump wherethe "bite" was. Today, before feeding her, I took her out toexamine the "lump". I moved her fur and found a huge hole! Ipressed, gently, on the hole! Oh Geez!!!:shock: Oh Goodness!! There was a Warble inthere! It was gray in color, so it was still young.I freaked :shock2:!!! I called my hubby and it took the bothof us to get the damn thing out. Gross!!! Neitherof us had ever seen anything like that before! It had made ahuge, deep hole which I cleaned out, as best as possible and thentreated with Triple Anti-biotic. I'll clean it every chance Iget, till it has healed. If it doesn't begin to heal, to theVet we will go.

 

Goodness Charlotte ,Lucky to have found it this soon, and good thing too .The baby , Im not surebut do they cause pain or any discomfort?

Talk about gross EWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!!!!!!!!

 

[dootsmom]

She didn't seem to have been in any pain ordistress, at all. However, she didn't fight me when we pushedit out or when I was cleaning the wound out. Believe me, Iwas "digging" around in that hole with Q-Tips and she only flinchedonce! So, I can only assume that even though she showed nodiscomfort when it was in there, I'm sure it "hurt like h*ll"!!