Are dogs susceptible to Salmonella?

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Patches

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As the title really.

Just wondering, with the raw food idea whether the dog is prone to catching anything from uncooked meat that poses a risk to us, if we were to eat raw/undercooked meat.
 
Yes I'm pretty sure they can, and transmit it to humans
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I'm willing to be corrected on this though.
 
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Yes I'm pretty sure they can, and transmit it to humans
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I'm willing to be corrected on this though.

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I did ask a while ago if we were more at risk from disease if our dogs ate a raw diet and was told no.......

I was just musing about it again this morning when I was preparing our chook for the oven.
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it can happenif in contact with infected dogs,cats, terrapins etc. or their faeces- its just a case of practising good hygiene and properly cooked food , then no problem!

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It's a raw diet though......so how can anything be considered cooked properly, or even cooked at all!
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A friend had a litter of pups with salmonella. They had to be very careful whilst dealing with them because of the risk of catching it themselves. I'm not too sure what was suspected as the source, but this was in the days before complete puppy feeds so their diet would have been mainly raw beef mince,
 
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A friend had a litter of pups with salmonella. They had to be very careful whilst dealing with them because of the risk of catching it themselves. I'm not too sure what was suspected as the source, but this was in the days before complete puppy feeds so their diet would have been mainly raw beef mince,

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Interesting.

When Chestnut Cob posted about diets a while ago I expressed my concerns of opening up ours and the children's risk to disease from a raw diet.

I was, at that time, told there was no added risk. I was worried initially about raw meat potentially contaminating carpets/floors etc by the dog, and if their faeces could possibly be more toxic.

It was only this morning when I suddenly thought about Salmonella that I posted this specific question. Seems it wasn't such a stupid fear after all.
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My kids are pretty clean, but if you don't know there's potential raw food material on a surface it becomes more risky.

I'm glad I'm moving over to Orijen now. Seems safer, whilst still a more "natural" ingredient list.

Thanks everyone.
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Yes, they can certainly get salmonella, I've seen pup's with it and seen two greyhounds die at work (vets) that had been fed on raw chicken, one died and one made it but was very very ill. It is a zoonotic disease so can be passed from animal to human so you'd need to be very careful when handling and ensure there is strict hygeine at all times xxx
 
I think I have heard that dogs and cats is <u>not</u> affected by/as sensitive to, salmonella in raw meat, the same way as we humans are.


I would imagine that if either lots of dogs eating raw BARF diet needed to be treated for salmonella by their vets or if lots of owners got salmonella because their dogs have gotten salmonella by eating a raw BARF diet, it would quickly decrease dog owners interest in feeding a raw BARF diet?


So somewhat unscientifically, I don't believe dogs are very susceptible to salmonella.

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ETA, I'm not saying they can't catch it, only that I think it is less likely that a dog get salmonella by eating raw meat compared to the risk for a human to catch salmonella by eating/being in contact with raw meat. /eta
 
This is interesting. Its not something I had considered specifically about feeding raw (I don't feed raw for other reasons). It was only when you posted about it I made the connection so to speak, I was sure I had heard of dogs with salmonella. I guess it would be very difficult when feeding raw to be strict enough about hygiene to ensure humans in the family weren't at risk too. My dogs go round the furniture wiping there mouths after dinner!
 
I've treated several dogs at work with salmonella and other diseases that can be caught from raw meat like E.coli. Although I agree with the natural aspect of a raw meat diet, I wouldn't feed it because of this. I assume that intensive farming methods increase the likelihood of disease compared to prey in the wild, but maybe prey animals and wild dogs just have better immune systems. I'm another person who wouldn't want to increase my exposure to it either. Having said all that, those people who feed raw diet don't seem to report a higher prevalence of salmonella. Maybe dogs fed on it from an early age develop some sort of immunity?
 
Yes dogs can get it.

Its very very rare and usually due to a compromised immune system.

As long as the floor around the food bowl is washed and anywhere you prepare it is shoved in the dishwasher its fine.

As for risk for you family. Only the usual likes plates and knives ect not washed properly.

For me the benefits far far outweigh the risks.
 
As a carrion eater of rotten meat a dogs digestive system has evolved over millions of years to deal with salmonella, e coli and other such diseases or canines just would not have survived. They do this by having a high level of acidity in their stomach and a very fast and short digestive system so that the bugs have no time to take hold.

To a naturally fed canine with a healthy immune system these bugs are no problem at all and they are not likely to excrete much live bacteria.

But turn a dog into a human by feeding it complex carbs and you have a problem. To gain any nutrients the whole system slows and becomes less acidic = Salmonella and their chums have a field day and they probably excrete loads of bacteria too!

Most raw feeders use human grade food sources, therefore provided the meat and bones are handled as you would your own food and hands and surfaces cleaned there is no more of a risk.
 
I was going to say, given the amount of rotten things dogs eat, and the growing popularity of raw feeding, wouldn't they be dropping like flies?

I just wish I could have kept it up with B, sorry KK, he is just one of 'those' dogs
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Most raw feeders use human grade food sources, therefore provided the meat and bones are handled as you would your own food and hands and surfaces cleaned there is no more of a risk.

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I get that bit, but I thought we had to cook our meat to avoid all risk. We're not just at risk when handling raw meat, it's a risk to us when not properly cooked too isn't it?

Are there more risks for a dog moving over from a lifetime (several years) of commercially prepared dry foods to a BARF diet then? Going by your information, which I fully comprehend, surely a "regular dog" who is say a few years old could potentially not have the correct flora in their gut to deal with the sudden influx of raw meat...from a bug point of view? I suppose like all things you'd have to swap them over gradually though which would eliminate/minimise the risk.

I'm not knocking the diet. I am all for natural feeding to a degree. I just can't decide how far removed from natural diets alot of our domestic canines are or how evolution could have potentially altered the way some breeds can/do deal with raw feeding both digestively and psychologically. There's probably no risk, and I'm over analysing things. I have read several posts which point to certain dogs needing a lower protein diet for temperament reasons, among others. Would these dogs, therefore, not do so well on BARF?

I just want to be informed to allay my fears before I rule the idea of the diet in/out.

 
I have always moved mine straight onto raw with no problems but if you wish to proceed with more caution I would suggest cooking meat to begin with (NEVER bones of course) then cook it less and less until it is raw.

Humans handle raw meat very well, I should imagine that a high percentage of diners order rare steak, some so rare it could still respond to recuss, restauant roast beef is usually served rare as is Lamb and even duck I believe, eggs are always a risk and lets face it you are just as likely to get these bugs from shared surfaces and fruit and veg. There is always minimal risk in everything we do including eating which is probably why trading standards enforce food hygene so rigerously.

To put it into perspective the canine digestive system has developed over millions of years, we have been feeding convenience dog foods containing complex carbohydrates for about 60 years, has a dog evolved in that time, I think not but a feed company rep or a vet trained by a company nutritionalist will tell you different I suspect!!!!! Kymythy Schultze says that it takes at least 3 generations of raw feeding to see the whole benefit, that to me says that we are not changing diets for the better and are storing problems for the future.

This insistence in limiting protein in cooked diets is alien to me, mine have a high protein content compared to sack food and yet are not at all hyper and are willing to rest when they have eaten just like a wild dog would do. I suspect that high levels of cooked protein combined with complex carbs might be a different matter.

There have been so few studies done because no one is interested in funding them, why would they, feed companies are doing well selling hypoallergenic ranges “dealing” with the fall out that standard ranges have possibly at the very least aggravated and vets are taking money for cleaning teeth, emptying anal glands and providing medication to deal with problems highly likely to be diet linked. There is no incentive to research a simple to feed “home made” effective diet.

I have had my 6 year old for 5 years and my 8 year old for 3 years and they have not been to the vet (touch wood) other than for a jab last year. Not good business is it?

What you really have to do is study dog food labels and ask awkward questions. Ask yourself what natural food would last that long on the shelf, so what are they adding to stabalise and preserve it. What has happened to all the natural nutrients on cooking? and if they were destroyed by heat, how have they been added back are they artificial? How are they making the food affordable, in other words what bulk are they using? If you don't like the answers and are worried what it will do to your dog, don't feed it.

Remember addatives DO NOT need to be declared if the feed company themselves do not add it, so if they buy a product to add there is no obligation to say, basically research the dirty tricks list the pros and cons and choose.
 
Just a quick thought, until the last couple of years my dogs were all fed raw, green tripe. It was definitely not human consumption at that stage (still had partly digested food in pockets of the lining
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), my dogs never had salmonella. I did once years ago have a bitch with barbiturate poisoning which vet thought must have come from a cow that had been killed with the drug in its system. Luckily she made a full recovery.
 
In a book I read called food your pets die for, it was clear that in the US euthanased everything was getting into pet food with few States even regulating what went in there, including the high levels of barbiturates which are not broken down by the extreme heat of cooking. That's the problem with unregulated meat and offal, mind you there are far too many instances of this type of meat getting into our food!!

CC I forgive you! There are sadly some that are very difficult to assist even with raw. Blue took a year and a half to completely detox, so who knows what he was eating or even his parents and grandparents!
 
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if the dog is on a raw meat diet then you would obviously practise safe hygiene, in other words wash hands properly after- no problem then.

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I think you're missing the point.
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My post is concerning whether the dog is susceptible to salmonella from eating raw meat, not referring to my handling of it.
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personally, I wouldnt feed raw chicken even if the dog was on a raw diet. My dads dogs always had rabbit, raw and not one ever got ill. I cook all Rosie's meat, simply because I don't want the mess in the house (of raw meat laying around). I always always buy meat from the butcher, so if it;s human- safe then its dog safe. handle and store it properly. Reading this, I think I'm even more put off with a raw diet and will just continue to give her cooked chicken and mince.
 
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