It’s funny how you become aware of things, before you
realize you’ve noticed. You get that nagging tug at the back of your mind;
something is different here. You start to look around trying to figure out what
is out of place, what triggered this feeling.
I had that out in the barn last week. I was feeding the
alpacas. Everybody was eating. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary,
Then I noticed Inara was eating while kushed. Her mother,
Godiva, use to do that all the time, but this was not typical for Inara. She
hopped right up when I walked over to her and went to eat out by another
feeder. I chalked it up to her just being lazy and left.
The next day, once again she was kushed while eating. This
time when I walked up to her, I noticed that she seemed a bit unsteady on her
legs as she walked away. I checked her temperature, which was normal, but there
was definite tremble in her back legs.
My first thought was PEM, (thiamine deficiency induced polioencephalomalacia). The typical treatment by injection large doses
of thiamine, or fortified B complex into the affected animal. Unfortunately, I
didn’t have any injectable thiamine on hand. A call to Linda, my vet, resulted
in her ordering some for me, but it wouldn’t be in until Monday.
The reason it is preferred to give thiamine by injection vs oral, is that
coccidian protozoa, a parasite of the intestinal tract, uses thiamine to
reproduce, thereby decreasing the amount available to the body. If you give
Vitamin B orally, you’re basically sending it straight to the critters that are
stealing it from the alpaca. By injecting thiamine, it goes straight to the
blood stream and bypasses the gut all together.
But since Inara was already showing neurological problems,
and some Vitamin B was better than nothing, I started giving her tablets.
After three days of vitamin slurries, Inara is showing
improvements. I finally got the injectable B complex, and I’ll switch Inara to
that until we get the results from the fecal to see if we need to be treating
for coccidia as well.