Tails From Provence

Aero’s Diary

…or more foot trouble.

It’s been a busy week, with visitors, unpacking, emergency vet visits and hospital visits (not me). Every day, I said “I will ride Flurry tomorrow and lunge Aero to see how he looks.” Every day, something came up and Flurry remained unridden, Aero remained unlunged.

I was determined to do stuff with them on Friday. While I was skipping out the paddock on Friday morning, I watched Aero moving around for a good while. He looked ok walking, but at one point himself and Lilly had a little trot around and he was definitely lame – not hopping, but definitely lame. I was pretty disheartened – this has been going on for weeks now. I was back to thinking X-rays and serious veterinary investigations.

I was filling the water trough a little later on, and Aero came over for a chat. I glanced down at the offending foot – what was that?

Goop running down from the coronary band near the heel – yippee!

I was now happy that it was indeed “just an abscess” and not navicular or some other horrible foot issue. The abscess had finally burst, and now I had to to my level best to get as much pus out of his hoof as possible. Forget about riding plans, it was time for some hot-tubbing, so the red bucket was filled with hot water and Epsom salts and Aero and I spent some quality time standing in the sun, while the stray pup (now named Dylan) lay in the shade of the old trailer and watched us. I am his universe, he can’t bear to leave my side, which is very sweet, but given his complete lack of horse sense and general ungainliness, he’s something of a liability around the horses. Peace reigned, though, Aero was his usual tolerant self, and Dylan was content to lie still so long as I didn’t wander off.

Once I had finished hot-tubbing, I studied Aero’s hoof. There’s a disturbing fissure in the wall of his hoof on the side where the infection came out. It runs from the sole upwards, and almost looks as if someone was trying to saw a piece off.

I suspect that ultimately, a large chunk of wall will shear off here, presumably due to the abscess.

I put a poultice on the back of Aero’s foot, wrapped it up and put one of the Cavallo Sport boots on to protect it. I was going to bring Pepper in to keep Aero company overnight, but Flurry volunteered for companion duty – he came straight up to me when I went down to the paddock! The two boys settled well, there was very little calling back and forth to Pepper and Lilly in the paddock overnight.

In the morning, there was a small amount of black pus on the poultice – I’d have been happier with more! Anja had advised using Clean Trax to completely disinfect his hoof now that there was a small opening on it, so Aero got to stand in the stable for an hour, with a big blue bag on his leg, but first, I finally got to ride Flurry! OMG, I was stiff! OMG, he was stiff too – or maybe my stiffness was reflected in him. I rode for about 45 minutes – it’s a start!

Then it was Clean Trax time.

Flurry was very curious at first,

and made faces at the smell

but he eventually got bored and stopped watching.

Finally, we were finished and both boys could go out again. Aero possibly looked a little less lame as he trotted off – I have my fingers crossed that this is the beginning of the end of the foot saga, but I suspect that fissure is going to cause some trouble.

The Latest Stray…

We live about three miles from the outskirts of Cork. Anyone who lives close to a city will know what I’m talking about when I say we’re a dumping ground for unwanted pets. Several times a year, there will be a new dog abandoned in our area. For a long time this was most noticeable around Christmas, but these days it happens any time.

A year ago, I picked Cookie up from the road near our house. Within days of us making the decision to keep her, a lovely, gentle, enormous greyhound walked up the drive, into the yard and lay down to sleep in front of the office. So thin he could be described as skeletal and with what looked like a gunshot wound on his shoulder, what could we do? Kick him out? We fed him, watered him and contacted all the rescue agencies. A specialist greyhound rescue charity took him in a couple of days later and we breathed a sigh of relief.

This is this year’s summer arrival.

We think he’s a little over six months – he has his permanent teeth. He’s a Doberman cross, our guesses on the other parent range from Labrador to German Shepherd to Great Dane. He’s a great big gentle giant of a puppy, painfully thin and lame in both front legs.

My neighbour fed him the first day he arrived in the area, then the next morning I was taking Cookie and Cinnamon out for their morning wee and the puppy followed us home – I swear I didn’t encourage him! He was my shadow for the entire day, while I skipped out the paddock, brought Aero in to treat his foot (there’ll be more on that later) and generally did all the little jobs around the place. He’s now sleeping about three feet away from me while I write this – on the other side of the door, though, he is just too big and gawky to have in the house!

He’s an absolute sweetheart, but his permanent home is not with us – our new landlord in France specifically said we can have Cookie and Cinny in the house, but no other pets. So on Monday, we’ll be onto the rescue organisations again. I’m happy to foster him until we leave, but I’ll keep hoping a permanent home turns up. I’m pretty sure whoever owned him is not going to come looking, though, and I wouldn’t be too happy about them taking him back if they did turn up – this dog has been thin a long time, and I suspect the sore legs might be from insufficient food for his growth rate.

Fingers crossed that the right home comes along for him.

What a Trip

We arrived back home late on Monday afternoon, did the usual unpacking and clothes washing jobs, checked up on Molly, the horses, cats and chickens (all well) and were then taken out to dinner by Granny (thanks Granny!).

When we got back, Cookie was in a big hurry to get out, so I dropped my bag in the back kitchen, where the dogs sleep, clipped on her lead, took her straight out and thought no more about my bag.

The following morning, the LSH was first up and took the dogs out. I was up a short while later, and started having my breakfast. After a few minutes, I became aware of some noise from the back kitchen – something plastic being rattled and chewed, presumably by Cookie.

“What on earth does she have” I wondered and for a moment I nearly ignored the noise, but something made me get up and check.

Cookie was in the dog bed, playing with something small and white… a pill bottle! Shit, where the hell did she get that? I picked it up – it was Cinnamon’s heart medication, but completely empty. Glancing around the room, I saw my bag lying in the middle of the floor, open, with a few bits and pieces lying around it (LSH later confirmed that it hadn’t been there when he took the dogs out, so it had only just happened). Cookie had opened the zip, taken out a few playthings, including the bottle of Vetmedin, opened the childproof (but clearly not dogproof) bottle top and scoffed the contents. I knew for sure how many had been in it – I’d bought the 60-tablet pack in France seven days previously, fourteen tables had been given to Cinny, so Cookie had probably eaten 46 tablets. Not good at all.

I rang Dave-the-Vet. He sounded groggy.
“Dave, Cookie’s eaten all of Cinnamon’s heart tablets.”
“Right… Cookie has eaten all of Cinnamon’s heart tablets.” Pause. “And you’re in France.”
(No, Dave, I don’t expect you to fly out to treat my dog…. No, Martine, don’t be a smartass, this is serious….)
“No, we’re back since yesterday” was a much more sensible response, and elicited a rapid “I’ll see you at the clinic in ten minutes.”

As I got Cookie’s leash, Cinnamon caught my eye, and I thought, well, there’s no harm in taking her along as well, there’s a chance she may have eaten some too.

As soon as I got to the clinic, Dave gave Cookie an injection. “This is pretty instantaneous,” he said, and told me to take her outside and walk around. We waited… and waited… and waited, until he decided he’d better give her a bit more.

She was quite woozy while he was injecting her the second time, and he told me that the emetic drug is morphine based – Cookie was high!

The second dose had the desired effect, and we scrutinised the result. Carambar wrappers, dental floss (good to know she’s into oral hygiene), and tablet-coloured goop. It didn’t look like 46 tablets worth of goop, we agreed. Presumably the tablets had scattered across the floor, and Someone Else may have eaten a share during the feeding frenzy that surely ensued. Our gaze fell on the Small Brown Dog.

We’d better do her too, we agreed, so, despite her protests, she was duly injected and once more we waited. And waited some more. And decided she also needed a second shot. I watched her watching Dave quizzically as he approached with the syringe. I’m pretty sure she was seeing several Daves approaching – probably a good thing in her eyes, she adores him!

She eventually produced the goods, so to speak, with a significant amount of tablet-coloured goop.

There was nothing more to be done but keep an eye on them, both dogs were now empty and stoned.

“They’ll probably sleep for the rest of the day,” he said. Yeah, right.

He didn’t take into account the fact that some of the heart medication had entered their bloodstream.

They were high as kites with frantically pounding hearts for the rest of the day. I did my best to keep them calm, but the slightest bit of excitement set them off, chasing each other, barking hysterically, running backwards and forwards around the kitchen.

By evening time they had calmed down, and presumably had the munchies. I gave them a light snack to keep them going, praying that the emetic was well out of their system. They ate normally the following morning, and proceeded to snooze for the rest of the day.

Crashed out is the phrase, I believe.

A lucky escape.