I've been putting all my fur up without gloves this year, even skunks.....that kinda makes me nervous, especially since we had to put my dog down, after it got into a skunk that tested positive for rabies this year.

dang man we have said many times to ALWAYS wear gloves







Bob

soooo.... ya think better than ave.??? seriously though have people actually contracted these kinds of bugs before?

i'd say you got a pretty good chance at getting them

Don't know of,and never heard of any trapper,or furbuyer contracting rabies.Many,many never wore gloves.
Would like to know if im wrong though.

I use gloves at times...but I have skinned and gutted many more without them. Like said above, I have never heard of anyone getting rabies from a dead animal. It is possible, but very very rare.

Now rabbit fever, and a few others, yes I have heard of it. Mostly some sort of infection that was cured with some anitbiotics or other meds.

I will say use them, but I wouldn't pass up skinning something cause I didn't have them handy. If the critter looks sickly, or just don't seem right to me, it gets tossed.

someone delete trapper124's post cause thats not what I want to hear.

I don't believe that the virus can live a long time once the body temperature goes below a certain mark. Seriously, go to the drug store and buy a big box of latex gloves. They are really not that expensive. If you are really concerned about this you should see your doctor.

You can only get it from their saliva. It would also show up in ten days. The good part is if we are ever bitten by a rabid animal we can take the shots and will be ok. This also inoculates us from rabies for several years later but i think we have to take a booster every year. The bad part about rabies is if we contract it and are diagnosed with it ...we can't be cured once we have it....it's a horrible death. I would wear gloves and be especially carefull around coons,fox,skunks mouths. BamaCoyote

The virus disapaites after 24 hours or more if its on the outside of the animal. The spine, brain, and associated fluids are another issue. I do not shoot any canines, coon or skunk in the head. Rabies are not worth the chance. You should wear gloves while skinning those animals as a minimum.
I will say rabies wasn't as common in years past (I've been trapping 50+), we never worn gloves years ago. In recent years rabies comes in waves up here in Maine. Ten years ago you couldn't find a coon or skunk around where I live, 3 or 4 years ago they were back; now their mostly gone again and its rabies. This is confirmed over & over in the local towns by analisys of dead specimens. When I was a kid, a guy died of rabies and it wasn't in a hospital. He died at home, knew what he had and chained himself to an object so he couldn't hurt anyone - it wasn't pretty from what I was told.
Be a smart trapper and wear gloves, they don't cost much by boxes of 50 or 100.

Wear the GLoves they are cheap and if nothong will keep your hands clean. I won't skin any carnivores without them and really prefer to use them for everything. Remember it may not ber you that gets sick if your around kids, elderly, sickly persons they could easliy get something else by casual contact with a doorknob or something else that you handle between the time you skin and the time you wash up. Just use the gloves. The chance that you would have contracted rabies is probally low as long as you didn't have open woulnds and exposed them to saliva or brain/spinal matter.

Why did you have to put the dog down bsd? Didn't the required rabies shot for dogs work or what?

you will surely die now.

If you were to get them bsd I would not blame you for biting trapper124

yur probally fine but id wear gloves from now on i actually was to cheap to buy them and just took plastic bags from the grocery store it was awkward but worked

You have a greater chance of catching rabies while setting den sets than you do skinning a long-dead animal. That's how livestock usually catch it. They eat the grass around the entrance to infected skunk dens and catch it that way. Sometimes I wear gloves, sometimes I don't. I seem to be doing alright.

It really comes down to this. There are NO absolutes on life. Will you absolutely get rabies from a Dead animal that has them, NO, But there is always that chance. And Rabies is NOT something to mess with. If you contract it without knowing it, by the time you show symptoms you are GOING TO DIE!!!!. That is Not a Might die, you WILL DIE, and there is NO treatment for it once it gets to that level. So you need to be careful at all times. Many people that trap get the preventative shots, so if there is ever a question it is only 1 or 2 more shots as a booster. IF you don't have the Shots, USE GLOVES!!!. Of the animals turned into the NYS Chemung county Department of Health in 2006 that were suspected of having rabies, almost 80% of them did indeed test positive. it simply is not a chance worth takeing.

I'm vaccinated.

Transmission and symptoms

Micrograph with numerous rabies virions (small dark-grey rod-like particles) and Negri bodies, larger pathognomonic cellular inclusions of rabies infectionAny mammal may become infected with the rabies virus and develop symptoms, including humans.

The virus is usually present in the blood and saliva of a symptomatic rabid animal. The route of infection is usually, but not necessarily, by a bite, and in many cases in animals, causes the victim to be exceptionally aggressive, attack without provocation, and exhibit otherwise uncharacteristic behavior[1]. Transmission has occurred via an aerosol through mucous membranes; transmission in this form may have happened in people exploring caves populated by rabid bats. Transmission between humans is extremely rare, although it can happen through transplant surgery (see below for recent cases), or, even more rarely, through bites or kisses.

After a typical human infection by bite, the virus directly or indirectly enters the peripheral nervous system. It then travels along the nerves towards the central nervous system. During this phase, the virus cannot be easily detected within the host, and vaccination may still confer cell-mediated immunity to preempt symptomatic rabies. Once the virus reaches the brain, it rapidly causes encephalitis and symptoms appear. It may also inflame the spinal cord producing myelitis.

The period between infection and the first flu-like symptoms is normally three to twelve weeks, but can be as long as two years. Soon after, the symptoms expand to cerebral dysfunction, anxiety, insomnia, confusion, agitation, abnormal behavior, hallucinations, progressing to delirium. The production of large quantities of saliva and tears coupled with an inability to speak or swallow are typical during the later stages of the disease; this can result in "hydrophobia". Death almost invariably results two to ten days after the first symptoms; the few humans who are known to have survived the disease were all left with severe brain damage, with the recent exception of Jeanna Giese (see below).

Geezerman is pretty much on target. From my days with the Old Tennessee Game & Fish Commision, this is what I was taught.

That post exposure treatment is only about 70% effective.
Rabies can lay dorment in the human system for as high as seven years. Even w/treatment, do you want to live seven years not knowing if you are one of the 3 in ten.

Sliva is not the only way to contract the disease. As GzM pointed out it can be transmitted in the air.

Road kill, presents a high risk of rabies infection.
Shot animals, exhibiting some sort of a-typical behavior are also high risk.

Trapped animals have a lower risk for rabies. The reason being that we trap anmials using their predictable behavior and normal behaviors against them. Rabid animals are not subject, for the most part, to their usual and normal behaviors, but are
a-typical and random in their behaviors.

However,that being said... , wear gloves, get pre-exposure rabies inoculations, and keep them up to date.

Adios,
45/70,