We took Danny to the vet and the hard lump we felt was fibrous tissue left behind by the abscess.  He had most of his shoulder shaved and a drain put in.

Since he had a large spot shaved, and a drain, Danny needed to stay inside. He quickly learned how to use the dog door and became a loving (cough cough) member of the family.  I was ready to keep him inside permanently, but due to his counter surfing, chewing on the furniture, and a small incident of locking Greg out of the house (Danny jumped on the door handle and locked the door), and then flooding the kitchen (Danny jumped onto the kitchen sink and turned the water on and ruined part of the kitchen floor),  Greg wanted Danny OUT.

Once Daniel got better, we put him outside with Rocket and Peetie. Rocky and Danny got into a fight, so we brought Daniel back inside. He stayed in for another week or so until Greg moved him out with Red, Monkey, and Pumpkin. Red isn’t too keen on having Danny as a pen mate, so we’ll see what happens.

A week later, Chester developed an abscess in his mouth, and was also prescribed pred + antibiotic. He cleared up, too. Good stuff, though heavy duty. It tends to produce side effects including accidental urination and thirst. We were surprised it was prescribed for Chester’s mouth problem, but it seems to be a drug of choice at our vet for strains and sprains.

Other news at Stinkypup is Decker’s radial subluxation. On Monday June 21st, Decker got beat up during a puppy party. Greg wasn’t around, so it was just me who pulled one dog off & hooked them up, pulled another dog off & hooked them up, and so on. I’m not sure who started the fight, but many snouts were involved, including Monkey, Pumpkin, Capella, Spike, Chester, Rocket, Ahab, Zeus, Nikki and Roo. All ten dogs were pulling and jumping and tugging on poor little Decker. Dog fights suck.

After I got everyone back on their chains I fed them, and then tended to Decker’s wounds. She had a couple of puncture wounds, which I shaved and cleaned. When Greg came home he helped me tend to the rest of her wounds. She had a long laceration on her back leg and bleeding puncture wound near her left armpit. We cleaned her up, gave her Rimadyl, Tramodol & Cephlex and put her in the pen. We’ve seen a lot worse, but were keeping an eye on her. She didn’t eat much on Tues. Wed. she ate a little and her wrist began to swell. We put ice on her wrist, which helped the swelling a lot. On Thurs. her entire arm began to swell. We iced it and the swelling went down, but she wasn’t getting better.

On Fri. we brought her to the emergency vet, who thought she just had a bad infection. She gave us Clavamox (a stronger antibiotic). Although the swelling went down, we now noticed she wasn’t bearing any weight on her leg and her wrist was floppy. She was breathing hard (a sign of pain in dogs), but I thought she was just too hot.

On Tues. we brought her to Dr. Flemme at Mt. McKinley animal hospital. Flemme is an expert in canine orthopaedics. He diagnosed her with lateral radial subluxation. He took e-xrays to confirm the problem. We left her at the vet and he was able to manually reduce the injury (meaning put the bones back where they were supposed to be without having to do surgery).

She needs to stay in a crate for 10 days and she’s quite uncomfortable. After that we’ll move her outside to the pen. I already told her she can move inside, but I think she prefers living outside with her sisters. She’s a shy girl.

Decker sporting a $200 cast.

Decker

So, that’s the current news from the StinkyPup ranch. Magic is adjusting to his cropped tail (I still need to take some pics), and of course, we all desperately miss Sam.

Monkey and Pumpkin can now be free in the yard together. For the past several years we only let one off at a time, since together they would beat up Scully, then Newtok. They might beat up Roo (who is not blond!) next. We’ll see.

A couple of weeks ago, there was a massive fight, with Newtok getting badly torn up. Capella also got injured, but we just put her on antibiotics. Greg was out jogging 11 miles, so wasn’t there to help. Our past-neighbor Mike King was in the neighborhood, and helped load Newtok into the Jeep so she could go to the emergency vet.

Newtok got staples, rather than stitches, and has a lot of shaved areas. We decided to let her stay in the house, which she is adjusting to nicely. Since Scully died just a few days later, this will probably be permanent.

Newtok is not (yet) a good alarm clock for Ilana, and is generally a mellow dog. But she does like to go on walks, and gets along well with the other dogs.

Asa is a very difficult dog to catch, so we’ve been leaving him free to roam in the dog yard. Monday the 16th, I went for a short 7 mile mush and Asa followed us, sometimes running behind us, sometimes in lead; he was having a great time. On our last stretch before home we encountered a neighbor who is known for having “alligator” dogs. An alligator dog is a dog who attacks a passing team.

As soon as we encountered the team, they pounced Asa. My neighbor managed to get his dogs off of Asa, I passed with my team and saw that Asa looked okay (no blood, he was running) and then stopped to see if his team was okay.  His responded, “your dogs passed on the wrong side! That’s why this happened.” I immediately took off and thought, “What a jerk! His dogs attacked mine, I stopped to help, and he’s yelling at me.”

When we got home, I couldn’t catch Asa to check him out, but he appeared to be happy and healthy. He may have had a slight limp.

—

The next night I took the “A” team out for a 12 mile run. I didn’t want to take Asa as a free runner because I wanted Chester to go, and I didn’t want to have two loose dogs. At the last moment, right before I was ready to leave the yard, I caught Asa. Greg put him on his chain.

I told Greg he should go ahead and have a party (meaning let the remaining dogs off), and I’d catch the ones he can’t catch (Simba and Rattles) when I came home. When I got home  and brought my team into the yard, I saw Simba and Rattles running around. Simba had a scratch on his snout and there was some blood in the snow.  I found Asa hiding in a private section of the dog yard and he had been beaten up quite badly, but not as bad as we have seen. We brought him inside, and decided that he didn’t have to go to the ER vet and we’d bring him for stitches in the morning.

The next morning, we dropped Asa off at our vet. I mentioned that Asa was Higgs’ brother, and it would be interesting to see if Asa had the same heart condition as his Higgs. One of the docs listened to his heart and said, “Nope. Asa’s heart is steady and strong. It’s nothing like Higgs’ rhythm.”

Around 1pm I got a call from the vet. “Hi, this is Dr. xxxxxx.”
I said, “Hi. How’s Asa?”
He said, “We lost him.”
I responded, “Okay.”
He said, “No, it’s not okay.”
He started to explain what happened and I was in too much shock to listen, so I told him I’d call him back. I tracked Greg down at work, and we drove to the vet’s office.

None of us know what really happened. The vet himself was surprised. They had given Asa some anesthesia. He began to wake up. They gave him a different type of anesethia…the gas kind. He was on a heart monitor. Everything was fine and the doc was almost finished, “two stitches from being done,” and Asa’s heart stopped. They couldn’t revive him.

Asa, we miss and love you!

Asa (left) and his brother Higgs

Fight(s) #1

• Nutok vs. Monkey: Nutok attacked Monkey while Monkey was still on her chain.  Nutok lost. The attack most likely occurred as a mini fight in the middle of the night while Duke was getting beat up by his brothers and sisters. Nutok ended up getting a bunch of stitches all over her body.
• Chevy (?) and/or Ahab (?) vs. Duke: Duke lost;  He got stitches in his eye, on one of his paws and inner thigh.

Fight(s) #2

• Everyone vs. Duke: Several days after Duke was feeling better, he was jumped by at least eight dogs.
• Nikki vs. Monkey: While Duke was getting beat up by everyone, Nicky decided it was time to kick Monkey’s ass. Monkey ended up with a puncture wound in her armpit.

Do-It-Yourself Vet Care

We try to do a lot of vet care ourselves. We’ve learned a lot over the years, but sometimes make poor decisions. We treated Monkey’s puncture wound as if it were a puncture wound on another part of the body (i.e., head, thigh, forearm). The usual treatment is antibiotics and flushing the wound 1-2X a day with a water-betadine mix).

After several days, it was clear Monkey wasn’t getting better. She was getting worse! I took her to the vet and she was diagnosed with subcutaneous emphysema (aka subcutaneous crepitus).  Since the placement of the wound was under the armpit, there was no muscle or fat to block the air from coming in. Monkey was filling up with air!!! When you pet her, she felt like bubble wrap.

Treatment for this was easy. The wound was sutured and she continued on her dose of antibiotics. She healed we’ll and no longer feels like bubble wrap or looks like a balloon.

Tonight, Monkey and Nutok were off their chains at the same time and had a little spat. Monkey got her right canine tooth knocked out— we’ll almost out. We’ll bring her to the vet tomorrow. It may fall out by then.

Bosco didn’t eat his breakfast this morning, and I didn’t allow him to go on walkies, although he would have if I left the gate open. Last night was the first night I didn’t hear him snoring while he was sleeping; I didn’t like the fact that he wasn’t snoring. Bosco’s snore helps me to sleep.

I hope he’s okay.

The sled dogs involved were Simba, Peetie, Duke, Red, Storm, Rattles, Monkey, and others. There were a couple of spin-off fights: Monkey and Roo, Red and Higgs– but everyone seems to be okay.