Flies and their bacterial loads in greyhound dog kennels in Kansas

• Published in: Current microbiology Vol. 36; no. 3; pp. 164 - 170
• Main Authors: Urban, J.E. (Kansas State University, Manhattan, KS.), Broce, A
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York, NY Springer 01-03-1998; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Animal productions; Animal, plant and microbial ecology; Animals; Bacteria; Bacteriology; Biological and medical sciences; BIOLOGICAL CONTAMINATION; Colony Count, Microbial; DIPTERA; Diptera - classification; Diptera - microbiology; DOGS; Dogs - microbiology; Enterobacteriaceae - classification; Enterobacteriaceae - growth & development; Enterobacteriaceae - isolation & purification; Food contamination; Food Microbiology - standards; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; KANSAS; Kansas - epidemiology; Kennels; Meat; Meat Products - microbiology; MICROBIAL CONTAMINATION; Microbial ecology; Microbiology; Miscellaneous; Normal microflora of man and animals. Rumen; PET FOODS; RENDERD MEAT; Salmonella; Salmonella Infections, Animal - epidemiology; Salmonella Infections, Animal - prevention & control; Terrestrial animal productions; Thawing; Vertebrates; Kansas; Fissipedia; Carnivora; Insecta; Quantization; Identification; Vertebrata; Trapping; Mammalia; Animal breeding room; Arthropoda; Bacteria; Invertebrata; Dog; Biological contamination; Diptera
• ISSN: 0343-8651; 1432-0991
• DOI: 10.1007/PL00006761

Breeders of greyhound dogs traditionally feed racing animals and nursing bitches raw meat, and that meat generally is obtained frozen from commercial renderers. Previous studies have shown that the rendered meat is frequently contaminated with enteric bacteria, including Salmonella spp., and that during thawing the rendered meat is exposed to filth flies common in dog kennels. Nursing greyhound pups tend to experience a high morbidity and mortality from intestinal infections, and we attempted to determine in this study whether enterics could be spread to pups through contaminated flies. At intervals during 1995 and 1996, flies were trapped or were net-collected from 10 dog breeding kennels in the region around Abilene, KS. Trapped flies were identified and counted to determine population numbers, and netted flies were cultured in tetrathionate broth and streaked to medium selecting for Salmonella sp. and other lactose-negative Gram (-) bacteria. The relative numbers of different fly species varied with the sampling method, but traps and sweep nets produced similar proportions of the different fly species. Blow flies were twice as likely to be contaminated with enteric bacteria as any other fly. The most common enteric bacteria found were Proteus spp., followed by Providencia spp., Pseudomonas spp., and Salmonella spp. The incidence of Salmonella and Proteus spp. seemed to correlate more with accessibility of flies to dog excrement than to rendered meat. The apparent high incidence of enteric contamination of filth flies clearly implicates them as vectors of enteric diseases in kennels