Causes for diarrhea?

[camel2]

Hello,

I had a friend ask me what can cause diarhea in a female bactrian camel. Her fecals have come back negative for parasites. She's also has a normal appetite and is still playful. The diarhea has been going on for several days now.

Thanks!
Danielle

[Gamal]

I do not know that much about camels (yet) although with other animals, I would check a change of feed ---- including green grass --- that may cause it. Rich feed causes diarrhea in animals especially alfalfa (which, I understand, should not be fed to camels at least not in great amounts)

Hopefully someone with camel knowledge will post a better answer for you.

[camel2]

Thanks for responding. The camel isn't on a rich diet by any means. She is in with mixed species such as deer, zebra and a couple of ratites.

[camel2]

Oops I worded that rather incorrectly.

She occasionally shares her enclosure with zebra, ratites or nilgai but doesn't have access to their food.

[Kameldame]

If you can no find any parasites I would may look for bacterial causes of diarrhea. You can ask you veterinarian to submit a fecal culture for Johnes desease (there is also a possibility to check the blood , mainly used for small ruminants and cows, but it is questionable if it is as good for testing camels, but it is much faster). An other idea would be to test it for salmonella infection or campylobacter infection (both would be a fecal culture as well). Hoped that helped. Good luck!

[Kameldame]

Oops, I forgit to ask: how old is that camel? Does she has an elevated body temperature?

An other thought: sometimes the fecal ID for parasites is not well done or not enough time to float is given for the parasite eggs to get to the surface. I would ask your vet to do a sugar floatation and to increase the floating time.