# Are all wild animals usually full of parasitic worms?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-all-wild-animals-usually-full-of-parasitic-worms/619557>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [April 22, 2012, 3:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-all-wild-animals-usually-full-of-parasitic-worms/619557 "2012-04-22T03:47:33Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\
**Post date:** [April 22, 2012, 3:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-all-wild-animals-usually-full-of-parasitic-worms/619557/1 "2012-04-22T03:47:33Z")

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When people try to domesticate feral cat and dogs and take them for a vet check up it seems that they are often full of various parasitic worms and have to be de-wormed. Is this natural for all wild animals? Are most wild animals chock full of worms?

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**Author:** ![SuperAbe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f17d59/32.png) [@SuperAbe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SuperAbe)\
**Post date:** [April 22, 2012, 5:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-all-wild-animals-usually-full-of-parasitic-worms/619557/2 "2012-04-22T05:01:45Z")

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> [@astro](#):
>
> When people try to domesticate feral cat and dogs and take them for a vet check up it seems that they are often full of various parasitic worms and have to be de-wormed. Is this natural for all wild animals? Are most wild animals chock full of worms?

Absolutely - and most humans on the planet are too ([first hit](http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=worms-human-parasites) searching for “human parasitic worm load” - not for the queasy). For a full treatise, see Carl Zimmer’s [Parasite Rex](http://www.amazon.com/Parasite-Rex-New-Epilogue-Dangerous/dp/074320011X).