February 2, 2007

California Sea Lions in Oregon Succumbing to Bacterial Disease
Salem-News.com
01 Feb 2007

The Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory at Oregon State University is working with the Oregon Marine Mammal Stranding Network to test California sea lions for leptospirosis, a bacterial disease that can infect numerous animals, including humans. An increasing number of sea lions have been reported dead on Oregon beaches during the past year, but officials aren’t sure if animal deaths are increasing or the reporting of those deaths has improved, says Jim Rice, an OSU research assistant who coordinates the statewide stranding network. Leptospirosis is considered a likely candidate for their cause of death.

“A lot of the deaths are in the southern part of the state, where we previously had very little coverage,” explained Rice, who works for the OSU Marine Mammal Institute, headquartered at the university’s Hatfield Marine Science Center in Newport. “We now have more eyes on the beaches looking for dead or stranded animals. “But the fact remains that there are a number of sea lions on the beaches that are dead or extremely emaciated and leptospirosis is a strong possibility,” Rice added. “Some of the emaciated sea lions disappear after a day or two on the beach, so it’s possible they may have recovered, or it’s possible they relocated and died elsewhere.”


Related Link


Duck Die-off Reaches Nearly 7,000
Record-Bee.com
01 Feb 2007

The avian cholera duck die-off continued Thursday as 305 ruddy ducks were recovered by the Department of Fish and Game, bringing the total amount of dead ducks to almost 7,000.

"We were only able to utilize have the day due to visibility," said Ryan Maki of the DFG. "We are going to have to wait until the fog clears up to go out tomorrow."

Avian cholera is not related to human cholera, and Associate Wildlife Biologist Paul Hofmann of DFG's North Central Region said he knew of no cases in which a human contracted the disease from a bird.



The European Student Chapter of the Wildlife Disease Association Presents the Second EWDA Student Workshop Wildlife Conservation and the Threat of Infectious Diseases

April 26-29, 2007
Acrotel Athena Pallas Village, Elia Beach, Sithonia, Halkidiki, Greece

The program of the Second EWDA Student Workshop is available here.

Invited speakers are:
Keynote lecturer Sarah Cleaveland, University of Edinburgh, UK
Keynote lecturer William Karesh, Wildlife Conservation Society, NY, USA
Alonso Aguirre, Wildlife Trust, NY, USA
Marc Artois, Veterinary School of Lyon, France
Andy Dobson, Princeton University, NJ, USA
Jacques Godfroid, University of Pretoria, South Arfrica
Christian Gortazar, National Research Institute on Game Biology, Spain
Spyros Kotomatas, Hellenic Society for the Study and Protection of the Monk
Seal, Greece
Albert Osterhaus, Erasmus Medical Center, the Netherlands
Sarah Randolph, University of Oxford, UK
Derek Smith, University of Cambridge, UK
Vrassidas Zavras, Environmental Issues Unit of the Piraeus Bank, Greece

The goal of the workshop is to give an opportunity to veterinary and non veterinary undergraduate and graduate students to meet and share the experience of internationally renowned wildlife health scientists. Not only will participants learn up-to-date and latest knowledge on the threat of infectious diseases to endangered wildlife populations, but they will foremost get acquainted with state-of-the-art scientific reasoning and rigorous habits of mind! The workshop is organized for and by students, to promote the scientific education of students for and by research, through outstanding oral communications presented by leaders in the field, panel discussions, student presentations and roundtables. Graduate students are
invited to present a poster of their research project.

Application form can be downloaded here.

Please, find more information on the brand new EWDA website!

The workshop flyer can be found here.

Registration fee: 40 EUR, including full-board housing and a one year student membership to the Wildlife Disease Association for the year 2008. Scholarships provided by the Wildlife Disease Association, the European section of the Wildlife Disease Association and the Field Veterinary
Program of the Wildlife Conservation Society will be available to partly cover travel costs of selected participants.

Registration and abstract submission deadline: March 2nd.


Journal Articles of Interest

Bovine Tuberculosis in Wild Boar (Sus scrofa), Red Deer (Cervus elaphus) and Cattle (Bos taurus) in a Mediterranean Ecosystem (1992-2004).
(Online abstract only)
Prev Vet Med. 2006 May 17;74(2-3):239-47.
J Hermoso de Mendoza and et al.

Re-infection of Wildlife Populations with Rinderpest Virus on the Periphery of the Somali Ecosystem in East Africa.
(Online abstract only)
Prev Vet Med. 2006 Jul 17;75(1-2):63-80.
RA Kock and et al.

Rinderpest Seroprevalence in Wildlife in Kenya and Tanzania, 1982-1993. (Online abstract only)
Prev Vet Med. 2006 Jul 17;75(1-2):1-7. Epub 2006 Mar 9.
P Rossiter and et al.

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