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syadasti

i heart mac
Apr 15, 2002
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VT
It would also be easier for a recovery if cat hoarders weren't around. The TP cat specific parasite makes otters sick and/or die from brain disease - a horrible way to die especially if you live in the water:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/02/120221104117.htm

Between 1998 and 2010, nearly 5,000 marine mammal carcasses were recovered and necropsied along the British Columbia and Pacific Northwest region of the U.S., including whales, dolphins and porpoises, sea lions and otters.

"Infectious diseases accounted for up to 40 per cent of mortalities of these marine animals," says Stephen Raverty, a veterinary pathologist with the Animal Health Centre in the British Columbia Ministry of Agriculture and Lands, and an adjunct professor in UBC's Marine Mammal Research Unit.
...
"The marine mammals that died of severe brain disease were infected with two common parasites, Toxoplasma and Sarcocystis, which are shed in the feces of feline and opossum hosts," says Michael Grigg, a researcher with the U.S. National Institutes of Health's Laboratory of Parasitic Diseases and adjunct professor in UBC's Marine Mammal Research Unit. "Expansion of host range for the opossum and climate change may be important factors contributing to the increased incidence of infection from these land-based pathogens."