| Green Dog Syndrome
By Sean Henahan, Access Excellence
 Ithaca,
NY (August 15, 1997)- The growing popularity of backyard composting
has produced an unexpected consequence- green dogs. The phenomenon is attributed
to a particularly nasty form of 'garbage gut' associated with ingesting
toxic microorganisms within the compost.
"We're seeing more and more cases of 'compost poisoning,' where the
fermentation of meat, dairy products and other food in compost piles produces
clostridial toxins that can be very nasty to a dog," said Larry J. Thompson,
D.V.M., Ph.D., a toxicologist in the Cornell University College of Veterinary
Medicine's Diagnostic Laboratory.
Cornell researchers got wind of the problem when veterinarians started
reporting a sharp increase in problems associated with "garbage gut."
"Particularly in warm weather, when animals ingest garbage with clostridial
toxins, we see severe vomiting, severe diarrhea, dehydration and sometimes
death if garbage gut is not treated," Thompson said. "As more people
utilize compost for degrading biological materials -- if they're not judicious
about what they put in their compost and how they protect their compost
pile -- dogs and other animal can smell the meat and gain access to the
compost."
The root of the problem appears to be meat scraps. Experienced composters
know that meat and oil products should be excluded from the compost pile.
For one thing, it attracts dogs and varmints. For another, it makes the
compost smell bad. Veterinarians add a third reason- toxic bacteria.
Composts can be a microcosm of potentially harmful bacteria to meat-foraging
pets, according to Patrick McDonough, Ph.D., a microbiologist at
the Cornell Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory. He pointed to Clostridium
perfringens, Campylobacter jejuni, Yersinia enterocolitica, Staphylococcus
aureus and some of the Salmonellae and Bacillus species as prime suspects.
"It's true that meat can be composted in some of the high-tech, in-vessel
systems that are now in commercial use. But please don't try this at home
-- for a number of reasons, including the 'attractive -nuisance' problem
with dogs and other animals. Also, if you simply make sure
your pile is enclosed on all sides, dogs won't be able to gain access,."
suggests Dan Cogan, a compost technology expert at the Cornell Waste Management
Institute.
Most of the compost garbage-gut cases recorded at the Cornell Veterinary
Diagnostic Laboratory involve dogs, Thompson said, hoping to alert pet
owners to hazards in their own backyards and to encourage owners to monitor
the health of dogs that roam the neighborhood. "Dogs are not put off by
smells that offend us humans," he said, "and dogs -- more so than cats
-- will eat garbage without hesitation. It takes all kinds of organisms
to make a compost work, but a dog isn't one of them."
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