OV9

Retired Ben posing in the last light of the day.

So a week and a half in…. I now feel able to discuss

As noted previously - 6yr old rescue dug has recently been for cruciate ligament surgery on both rear legs. It’s pretty major stuff - slicing right through the leg bone below the knee. One side healed great. The other was still lame - more surgery needed. Damn.

Surgery went well, but another 2 weeks of crate-based rest needed. Brought out for toileting and feeding only. After week 1 we were allowed to bring her out so long as we were there to ensure she didn’t jump up on the couch, or go upstairs etc etc.

So we had her out in the living room in the evening - still in pain clearly, but calm. I was kneeling beside her as she lay down. Pup comes into the room and - as pups do - bounds towards her.

In way less time than it takes to read this, recovering dog fears her leg is about to be bashed and decides to issue a “stay the fuck away” warning to said pup.

Suddenly the pup is howling - I think a warning has just been issued and follow her into the hall, where it is clear all is not well. Blood. Quite a bit of blood. And I am sure your cheek isn’t supposed to look like that.

Emergency vet overnight to keep her pain under control. She’s taken a bite to her muzzle - upper jaw. Puncture wound 5mm from the eye ball - very lucky really. But worse damage on on the underside of the upper jaw. Specialist dental vet surgeon at the other side of the country the next day (they look after the animals at Edinburgh Zoon and Blair Drummond Safari park - including all the big cats.

5 hrs of surgery. 3 teeth removed with the fractured slice of jaw bone. Luckily only 1 of those was an adult tooth, so hopefully the others will grow in shortly.

7 days of feeding soft food, with a mandate that no chewing is allowed on anything - hard or soft. Erm. A puppy that isn’t allowed to chew?

We ended up putting her in a soft muzzle in addition to her buster lampshade collar as it was proving impossible. Not a fun week.

All now good. She is acting like she hasn’t experienced an issue at all. Still diving at both other dogs to play. The arsehole.

We also had the older dog in a soft muzzle for a week. Renewal of trust required. All seems well - vet was adamant that this was a clumsy warning as opposed to any intent to harm.

So yeah. Stressful! but we appear to be back on track.

Please only click this spoiler if you are OK with slightly gory images. Image of the upper jaw. Pre-operative condition. To state the blindingly obvious - all of these teeth are supposed to be in a straight row…

(Edit: please don’t ask me to add up how much all this collective surgery has cost over the last couple of months. We are easily into small car territory )

Spoiler

Poor pups, nothing worse than having to deal with one poorly dog, never mind 2. Hope all heals ok

Bloody ell Mik, sorry to read this! Hopefully you've now had all the drama for the next few years now

Pups bounce back when they aren’t Sheltered from everything so this will just be a valuable lesson for it hopefully.

Dogs teeth and bite strength is huge, it’s easy to forget when you play with them all the time.

Dave!

Cripes

Gws all, I hope they're ok with each other again.

Goodness me, that's a bit of an ordeal. Hopefully they'll ask be recovered soon.

Thank you for hiding the gory pictures.

Fucking hell, Mik! Glad you're all OK.

Holy fuck, took me a second to realise what's going on from the picture. Just seems a really unfortunate angle as she got bit inside the mouth
GWS doggo.

Fucking hell, what a horrendous experience for you all.

Glad she's on the mend Mik, at least it doesn't seem to have affected how she is with other dogs which is a good thing.

Thats shit all round

Cheers all. 2 weeks tonight since the incident, and she is massively improved. Soft muzzles are all off and all getting on well again.

Facial fur still growing back below her eye - shaved so they could work on her, but the puncture wound there is healing nicely. Back on normal food and quite happy.

The damage inflicter was rated 4/10 for lameness a pipe of weeks back, and only 1/10 at the weekend, so her recovery coming along well too.

As Dave highlights - a reminder of the bite strength of animals we trust implicitly. I really wouldn’t like to be on the receiving end of a Police dog…..

mik wrote: ↑Thu Nov 04, 2021 10:32 pm all getting on well again.

Good news update

Yeah brill news.

GWS Pup!!

A new addition to my pack - meet Doug. He'll be coming home with us in 3 weeks.

You just can’t have too many dogs

Flash bit through a cow femur, fully intact as he decided he wanted the marrow inside it. No build up, just saw him lay down and squeeze harder till crunch, one bone crunched down, a few more bites and it was 2 pieces

Dave!

please confirm breed.