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Deworming Dogs
If you clicked on this page, you want to know the procedure for
deworming dogs. This page is broken into several sections, one
for puppies under 8 weeks of age, one for puppies 9 weeks of age and
older, one for adult dogs and a section that goes over sanitizing your
property after worm infection.
Puppies are almost always born with Roundworm and/or Hookworm.. It is
passed to them via their mother's placenta in utero or through their
mother's milk. The stress of pregnancy and birth activates the
encysted (dormant) worm larvae within the mother's body infecting her
pups. Treating the dam before pregnancy reduces the burden but
does
not eliminate the passing of worms. If your dog has
puppies, you have
no choice but to treat these pups for worms, because the reality is
that
they have the best chance to thrive if you do.
Pups should be treated while they are stable, not when they are
stressed. If conditions such as being chilled, ill, crowded, in
unsanitary conditions or being abruptly weaned from their mother exist,
correct these before worming. Very young puppies need to be
wormed often, by a medication that addresses their most immediate
parasitic
risk, in a gentle and easy to administer way, and for this reason I
prefer Nemex-2  or Pro-Wormer 2 .
The main ingredient is Pyrantel Pamoate which is gentle and can be
given to puppies as young as two weeks
old, ensuring that any potential Hookworm or Roundworm issues remain
under control. Puppies should be wormed at 2 weeks to prevent
them
from contaminating their environment and again at 4, 6 and 8
weeks.
Worms in very young puppies can result in severe illness or
death.
Worming early ensures that the puppies grow and thrive and keeps the
people in their environment safe from the infection cycle.
Older puppies are at risk for more types of worms as they are now
running around and are also eliminating in the outdoors by
this time. My favorite non-prescription wormer for dogs and
puppies of this age is Panacur-C  or Safe-Guard . Panacur-C and Safe-Guard are powders that you
mix into your dog's food. One package is given each day for three
days. This wormer rids dogs of whipworm, roundworm, hookworm and
even works on some tapeworms and has the added benefit of working on
lungworms, threadworms and lungflukes as well.
Tapeworms are the least dangerous and easiest to spot however, so if
you see little white things coming out of your dog's rear-end or in
stool that resemble grains of rice consider using Drontal
instead. Drontal is an excellent choice that can be purchased
without a prescription from Australia. Drontal can only be used
on dogs and puppies over 3 weeks of age and 2lbs of weight.
Treatment is administered through one tablet, also available in a
chewable form. Another wormer that is excellent for tapeworms is
Droncit, however tapeworms are the only worms that Droncit
addresses. Again, Droncit can be bought without a prescription
from Australian vendors.
Breeders Note:
If you are a breeder it can be extremely costly to worm your adult dogs
and pups through over the counter worming medications. An
alternative Safe-Guard
10% for Horses and Goats which is (fenbendazole) the same
ingredient as Panacur and Safe-Guard, it is dosed at 1ml per 4.5 lbs of
bodyweight, distributed in food for three consecutive days and
comes in a 1000ml bottle for a little over $107.00 each.
If your dog is under 7 months old and is not an Ivermectin sensitive
breed (Australian Shepherd, Collie, Shetland Sheepdogs, Old English
Sheepdogs, Long-haired Whippet, McNab, Silken
Windhound, etc.), the simplest and cheapest method of heartworming your
dog
is to order meds from an Australian vendor for 12.00 dollars for a 6
month supply of heartworm med coverage for dogs weighing up to 20lbs
and 16.00 dollars for a 6 month supply of heartworm med coverage for
dogs weighing 41lbs - 80lbs.
Ivermectin Sensitivity
Note:
Ivermectin sensitive breeds are genetically more likely to have a trait
that makes Ivermectin dangerous for them, the MDR1 gene. Three
out of every four Collies have it and for other breeds the liklihood is
much less. To find out for sure, have your dog tested for
the
gene.
I use Heart Gold which is a generic version of Heart Guard that can be
bought in quantities of 20 tablets and above. My mom and I bought
a bottle which we split between our small dogs, I ended up paying about
.96 cents per month for my dog's meds.
Australian's aren't required to get a prescription for these meds like
we are here in the US, so you can save a substantial amount of money by
starting your pup early on a heartworm program using Australian meds.
I discovered this little known method when I started calling local vets
about heartworm, looking for the best prices on the medications.
To my absolute shock they refused to write a prescription for a 10 week
old pup without performing a 40.00 dollar heartworm fecal test.
Well, I had done my research and knew that if they test a dog less than
seven months old that the test will come out negative because the test
can only detect mature worms, and that these worms do not reach
maturity until at least five months of age. Even the Merck
Veterinary Manual states that testing is only necessary if starting a
heartworm program at 1 year of age or older.
I was furious to think they would charge me for a meaningless
test just to appease the pharmaceutical manufacturers. In
Australia, they reccomend testing at a year and a half
and annually after that. This made much more sense to me and so I
decided to take the lead of the Merck Veterinary Manual and the
Australian Vets over American
legistlation on this one.
Even Intercepter (safe for the aforementioned Ivermectin sensitive
breeds) is cheaper and can be purchased without a prescription and
Milbemax (also safe) can be purchased reasonably and also takes care of
roundworms, tapeworms, hookworms and whipworms as well.
Breeder's Note:
If you are a breeder, buying Ivermectin directly is the way to go as
spending a minimum of 25.00 per month to heartworm 25 or so dogs (using
my
affordable, buy from Australia system) is still a lot. Injectable
1% Ivomec for Cattle can be bought very ecomonically for
oral administration to dogs (most people do not use it for dogs because
it is rather concentrated for use in larger animals and dogs need a
very low dose for the purposes of heartworm prevention. Dosages
are much higher to treat mange or a heartworm infection, so please
don't confuse these larger dose recommendations for other forms of
treatment with heartworm prevention.)
Heartworm prevention doses are 2.72mcg of Ivermectin per pound of body
weight. To dose using Ivomec for Cattle 1%, use a 10ml syringe to
dilute 1ml Ivomec 1% with 9ml propylene
glycol to create a 10ml
solution that now contains 1,000 mcg of Ivermectin.
The dosing formula is:
Weight of the dog in pounds X 2.72 mcg per pound of body weight ÷
1000mcg per ml.
Examples:
A dog weighs 10 lbs, 10 x 2.72 ÷ 1000 = .03ml (rounded)
A dog weighs 45 lbs, 45 x 2.72 ÷ 1000 = .12ml (rounded)
A dog weighs 85 lbs, 85 x 2.72 ÷ 1000 = .23ml (rounded)
Measure out with (TB) Tuberculin syringes .5ml. These syringes
are calibrated in hundredths. The first line closest to the
needle is 0, the next slightly larger calibration line is .05 and then
it moves to .1 with .5 being the last line of measurement.
Administer
orally by injecting into a piece of meat to hide
the bitter flavor. Give monthly for heartworm prevention.
If your dog has worms it is
important to prevent your dog from
reinfecting his or herself through their environment. Breaking
the worm cycle is an important aspect of treatment; without which it is
difficult to ensure that your efforts to deworm your dog will be
effective.
You can sanitize concrete or gravel surfaces with lime, salt, borax or
bleach. Bleach is the safest, most economical way of sanitizing
the area (use a dilution ratio of 1:32).
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From De-worming Dogs back to Dog Worms Page
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