Abstract
Two adult female bison, housed in an outdoor research facility and observed daily, died suddenly three days apart. Minimal coordination and behavioral changes were observed in one animal the evening before being found in a moribund state. Malignant catarrhal fever was suspected in both bison due to a recent confirmed MCF case with similar course. The cause of death was not apparent from necropsy, but brains of both animals were strongly positive for rabies virus antigen by fluorescent antibody and/or immunohistochemical tests. Minimal to mild encephalitis with Negri bodies was observed on histopathology. The bison were located in an area that had not been endemic for skunk rabies; however, a case of rabies in a skunk had been discovered 1.6 km north of the bison paddock two months prior to the bison cases.
Highlights
There are few reported cases of rabies in bison (Bison bison)
The primary differential diagnosis was malignant catarrhal fever (MCF) due to ovine herpesvirus2 (OHV-2) as a previous case had occurred in the same herd two months earlier
Tissues were fixed in 10% buffered formalin for histopathology and fresh spleen was submitted to Colorado State University (CSU) Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory (CSU-VDL) for OHV-2 PCR
Summary
There are few reported cases of rabies in bison (Bison bison). A single case occurred in North Dakota in 1998 and was described in a case report [1]. 3 cases in South Dakota bison have been reported in surveillance summaries since 1960 [2, 3], and a case in a European bison (Bison bonasus) in Russia has been reported [4].
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