A Stinky Update

I haven’t updated the Stinky blog in a while. Here’s what’s happened:

• Spring 2014: Spike had her first obstructive bowel surgery. I’m not really sure what she ate, even after viewing the item– which the vet saved for me.  It’s possible it was a hair tie. What ever it was, it caused Spike to stop eating for several days and I brought her to the vet, where they took ex-rays and told me she needed surgery. It took over 1.5 weeks for Spike to start eating after her surgery.
• Summer/Fall 2014:
  • Stubby had her second obstructive bowel surgery. Stubby loves to eat pieces of our dog door. Unfortunately, the plastic didn’t pass and was stuck in her stomach and intestines.Stubby had chronic diarrhea after her first obstructive bowl surgery in June. She was put on all different types of antibiotics– which didn’t help. Finally I changed her food to Science Diet Z/D and the diarrhea went away.  Unfortunately, it reappeared after her second surgery, and it won’t go away. We’ve tried Tylan, Clavamox, Cephalexin, Probios, Psyllium, and Nystatin (which is a medication for yeast)– nothing is working. Her poop shoots out like a fountain :(
  • Peetie had a big amount of hair loss.  The vet prescribed a bath. Have you ever bathed a sled dog? It’s not fun, especially when it’s below freezing. Instead of giving him a full bath, I washed the area where he had hair loss. This didn’t seem  to help, so I took him off of Rimadyl for over a week and the vet prescribed Prednisone– which he is currently taking.
• Fall 2014:
  • We’ve started fall training! It snowed in the beginning of October and hasn’t melted.

    

    

  • I brought Lasher to the vet to have his heart checked out because his brother Goblin has heart failure.  The good news is his heart is fine, but I should have it checked every 6 months or so. The bad news is I shouldn’t run him because he has flat feet and his elbows stick out. The vet said he can run free, but not in harness– not even for 7 miles.I decided to keep Lasher and Dru.  They are two of the four dogs I was taking care of for 6 months for my neighbor. Lasher is just the sweetest boy! and he is a litter-mate to Goblin (heart failure guy) and Myra (Achilles heel injury girl who now lives inside). I hate to break up families :) He’s also a good leader– even though I’m not supposed to run him– as is Dru. Dru, although very shy and around 8 or 9 years old, is a great gee/haw leader. I just got her spayed and had a tumor removed from her right elbow.
  • Goblin’s health is slowly deteriorating.  He has a bad cough and had one fainting spell. He is on major heart meds for his heart problem:
    • 1.5 Vetmedin  2x a day 1 hour before food
    • 1.5 Lasix 3x a day
    • 1 Spironolactone 2x a day
    • 1 Enalapril 2x a day
  • We made it an entire year without a Stinky death! Oct. 28th, 2013 was our last death– Duke.  According to Dr. Newby we’re supposed to have 3-4 deaths a year, and not having a death is statistically unlikely.