The Animal Doctor

DEAR DR. FOX: I just read your column about animal suffering and the need for better animal protection laws -- and for their enforcement. It was refreshing to see my beliefs so succinctly expressed.

For years, I have been calling for all acts of animal abuse to be federal felonies. Local laws are not the answer when the entire country needs to have the same policies. We should also have a federal registry of animal abusers like we have for sexual predators. The public should have access to that information.

There are so many pets that live in despair. Animal care personnel or police should not have to get permission from abusers in order to take animals out of hellish situations.

Animals should not be used in labs, where many are kept in bare cages without any socialization and endure torture until being killed. Their lives are nothing but fear, pain and hopelessness. Their only escape is death. And farm animals should have the same protections as other animals.

A huge number of abandoned and homeless pets are trying to survive on the streets. The animal care groups that are meagerly funded by government are useless in addressing this problem; they have revolving doors, taking in strays and killing them to make room for a new batch. They don't take care of the medical needs of the animals, and probably kill more animals than they adopt out. The not-for-profit groups do as much as they can for the animals, but our tax dollars don't support them. They have to depend on donations in order to keep their doors open.

I believe there are many people who would join a movement dedicated to making the changes our society needs, but efforts today are scattered, and the funding isn't there. I just want to know: Where is our humanity? -- J.G., Boynton Beach, Florida

DEAR J.G.: It is evident from the United Nation's 2019 IPBES Global Assessment Report on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (ipbes.net/assessment-reports/eca) that we have yet to learn to share this planet with other intelligent life forms. Doing so would be for our own good, which is bound to that of the other beings who compose and sustain the planet's community, even if we do not respect and care for the least of them. Without the ethics of respect and care, we are less than human and have become the most dangerous species on Earth. Inhumanity has no bounds -- ecologically, spiritually or ethically.

The ethics of respect and care awaken compassion and empathy, broadening into bioethics and giving rise to the One Health movement, which is now recognized by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (cdc.gov/onehealth). The One Health framework is being embraced by more and more physicians, veterinarians, farmers, foresters and others who wish to protect animals and natural resources.

War, slavery and genocide -- culturally accepted norms throughout all of human history -- have their equivalents in our treatment of animals: the "wars" against pests and predators; the extermination and extinction of many species and their habitats; the enslavement of beasts of burden; the torture of animals to test cosmetics, other consumer products and even military weapons. Domestic animals are still treated primarily as commodities with minimal government oversight, and welfare standards are not always effectively enforced.

It will take a massive cultural shift -- ethically and economically, if not also religiously -- for domesticated and captive wild animals (such as those on fur farms) not to be regarded as commodities, and wild animals as trophies. In my opinion, that shift is long overdue for the sake of our humanity and the rest of life on Earth!

PET REPTILE PUBLIC HEALTH WARNING

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, contact with pet bearded dragons is the likely cause of the salmonella Uganda infections that affected 44 people across 26 states last year. Of the 33 people with salmonellosis interviewed by public health officials, 21 reported contact with a bearded dragon before falling ill.

The CDC recommends washing your hands after handling a bearded dragon, keeping the reptiles out of the kitchen, not eating or drinking near them, keeping their supplies and habitats clean, and not kissing or snuggling them.

Terrapins (water turtles) are another frequent source of salmonella infections in humans. These and other reptiles should never be released back into the wild: Look at the invasive python issue in Florida. In my opinion, reptiles should never be purchased in the first place, even if bred in captivity rather than being legally imported -- a practice which the U.S. government should prohibit for humane and conservation reasons.

(Send all mail to animaldocfox@gmail.com or to Dr. Michael Fox in care of Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106. The volume of mail received prohibits personal replies, but questions and comments of general interest will be discussed in future columns.

Visit Dr. Fox’s website at DrFoxOneHealth.com.)

DEAR DR. FOX: You have written about animal sentience and feelings, and I want to ask you about plants. They, too, are sentient in some ways; I have been told they respond to human touch and are more sensitive than we give them credit for. What is your opinion? -- R.E., Washington, D.C.

DEAR R.E.: My recent columns have addressed the issue of animals having feelings: emotional reactions similar to our own. It would be an omission not to mention plants.

Contemporary "forest bathers" and Indigenous peoples alike know there is wisdom and healing in plants, and that we can derive benefits from our feelings and communications with plant life. Some cultures believe that their crops are healthier and more productive when sung to.

Nobel Prize winner and plant geneticist Dr. Barbara McClintock observed, "If you pinch a leaf of a plant, you set off electrical impulses. ... There is no question that plants have all kinds of sensitivities. They do a lot of responding to an environment. They can do almost anything you can think of."

"The Secret Life of Plants," a 1973 book by Peter Tompkins and Christopher Bird, documented controversial experiments that claim to reveal phenomena such as plant sentience. This set the stage for more research into the sensitivities and intelligence of plants, which are attuned to each other and to insects and other animals in their environments. For instance, some flowers open to make nectar more accessible in response to the sounds that bees make while hovering over them.

"Finding the Mother Tree: Discovering the Wisdom of the Forest" by Suzanne Simard, just published, is a landmark treatise opening up the reality of the symbiotic communication between trees and fungi, and the evident sentience of interdependent plant life. Plants use chemical and electrical signals to communicate with each other (wired.com/2013/12/secret-language-of-plants). Plants can communicate with insects as well, sending airborne messages that act as distress signals to predatory bugs.

I am very concerned about the impact of various herbicides, insecticides and fungicides, as well as nonionizing radiation from cellphone towers and power lines, on these highly evolved interspecies communication systems and symbiotic relationships.

DEAR DR. FOX: I am a musicologist, and was enthralled when you described playing your flute and having a socialized wolf howl/sing in harmony in your book "The Soul of the Wolf." Some dog owners tell me their dogs like to sing along when they are playing a musical instrument. Others say their dogs howl when they hear a siren because it hurts their ears. What is your opinion on this? And do you agree with me that many animals like music? -- L.V., Palm Beach, Florida

DEAR L.V.: Music can certainly help calm animals. Dairy farmers are well aware that soothing music makes their cows more productive! As for dogs, I have always felt that they howl when they hear a siren because the sound triggers an innate communication response.

Wolves will howl to communicate with pack members when separated. Group howling may have a territorial function, informing neighboring wolf packs of their presence. The lone-wolf howl is like the lonely howl of dogs left alone all day that touches our hearts.

According to an opera singer who heard the ululating howls of my socialized wolf (whom I had raised during my studies of canid behavior and communication), she was "chording" -- singing two notes at the same time -- while I played my flute. My interpretation is that such singing is a soulful expression of communion or joy.

In the book I wrote with my wife, Deanna Krantz, "India's Animals: Helping the Sacred and the Suffering," I describe how the top dog at her animal sanctuary would respond when I played my flute: "On hearing my first note, he would utter a cascade of high-pitched whines and whistles that ignited the entire (resident) pack in a cacophony of yips, yaps, howls and birdlike whistles and trills of happiness that spread to the nearby village, where community dogs began to sing." I imagined this wave of song spreading across the subcontinent.

(Send all mail to animaldocfox@gmail.com or to Dr. Michael Fox in care of Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106. The volume of mail received prohibits personal replies, but questions and comments of general interest will be discussed in future columns.

Visit Dr. Fox’s website at DrFoxOneHealth.com.)

DEAR READERS: I am sure many readers who love cats and wildlife will appreciate the article "The Outdoor Cat: Neighborhood Mascot or Menace?" by New York Times reporter Maria Cramer. She makes it very clear that one of the best solutions is an outdoor cat enclosure, or a "catio," to help protect wildlife and cats from injuries and cat-to-cat diseases.

But I was surprised at one serious omission in her article: No mention was made of the number of diseases cats can pick up outdoors and bring back into the home if they are allowed to roam free. These are called zoonotic diseases, and cats are more of a public health risk in this way than rats! According to the Merck Veterinary Manual (2010), there are at least 27 known cat-to-human zoonotic diseases. In addition, cats have infected people with influenza virus and COVID-19, and vice-versa. In contrast, a report from Washington State University lists only 12 rodent-to-human zoonotic diseases (see iacuc.wsu.edu/zoonoses-associated-with-rodents-wild).

As for cats controlling rats, adult rats are a challenge for most cats. Even if they do catch or kill one, cats (and their families) could be at additional risk from diseases the cat could catch from the rodent.

People are potentially at risk, children in particular, from petting any stray cat or from living with an indoor-outdoor cat. It is especially worrisome for children to play in sandboxes and other playground and garden areas where cats may have evacuated.

There is no need to get rid of your outdoor-indoor cats! Just visit the excellent American Bird Conservancy guide (abcbirds.org/program/cats-indoors) on how to make indoor life a safe and stimulating place. Ideally, you should have two cats, plus an outdoor enclosure or catio.

CATS OUTDOORS AT RISK FROM FUNGAL DISEASES

Often underdiagnosed when cats go blind, develop a fever, become lethargic or anorexic, or develop skin nodules and respiratory distress, histoplasmosis is a fungal disease in the soil. It is the second most commonly reported fungal infection in cats, following cryptococcosis.

Cryptococcosis is a type of fungal infection that occurs when a cat inhales spores from a type of fungus that grows in organic material such as soil, decaying wood or bird guano (especially droppings from pigeons). Spores also can enter the skin through an open wound.

Since these fungi are everywhere in the soil, cats are likely to get the soil on their paws and ingest it when grooming, along with fungal spores. The spores could be inhaled or get into the fur in dry and dusty weather and when cats dig into the soil chasing small rodents or making a pit in which to defecate. These fungal diseases are a major reason to keep cats indoors and never use soil in the cat's litter box.

TEARFUL DOGS

The results of an experiment in Japan, published in Current Biology, reported that some dogs got watery eyes when reunited with their owners after more than five hours apart. The "tears of joy" response appeared to be driven by production of oxytocin, or the "feel-good hormone." People looking at photographs of dogs were more likely to want to nurture ones with watery eyes, suggesting that dogs might have evolved to tear up to get affection. (Full story: The New York Times and The Guardian, both Aug. 22)

Readers have informed me that their dogs shed tears when distressed. Such weeping from the eyes is also seen in other species when distressed, notably elephants and water buffalo.

Dogs who seem to cry a lot, especially small, fluffy breeds, should see a veterinarian because they could have chronic and potentially serious eye disease.

(Send all mail to animaldocfox@gmail.com or to Dr. Michael Fox in care of Andrews McMeel Syndication, 1130 Walnut St., Kansas City, MO 64106. The volume of mail received prohibits personal replies, but questions and comments of general interest will be discussed in future columns.

Visit Dr. Fox’s website at DrFoxOneHealth.com.)