Scary..cautionary tale

kalico · Scary..cautionary tale

On the 2nd of January, Kali was out with us for a walk..at 3pm she was running around enjoying some freedom from the pups (then 5w old) and by 4pm she was collapsed and not far from death.

We found her in the run in a collapsed state, stiff, staring and unable to move. I am a Vet Nurse, so i called my boss and arranged to meet him at the surgery..everything was going through my mind..he checked Kali over who had very poor circulation by then, was lapsing in/out of consciousness and her temperature was 105. She was immediately put on a drip and we began taking bloods etc...her calcium levels were normal and the only thing to see was a very slight redness on one teat..that was it..within 12hrs her teats on the LHS were 3 x the normal size and solid..over the next few days Kali was on a drip and still lapsing in/out of a conscious state.

Three days after her collapse her mammary gland turned black and burst open..a case of acute mastitis, she has also had septicaemia and toxic shock.

The gland basically fell open, at its worst the hole was 7" across with a 3" inner section...i have pics..but they are VERY graphic.

Thankfully now, 16 days on she is healing nicely and is well on the road to recovery..but it has been a long and scary haul.

BritAnnie

How awful for you. I had no idea this could happen, and so quickly. I am SO glad she is on the mend. It must have beena nightmare looking afer the pups while she was so ill. I really wish I could have that last little lad - he looks beautiful, and I love the breed, but common sense must prevail. I am sure you will find a loving home for him. The first ones I ever saw were Penny Patullos and I fell in love with them then - I think she was trialling Cassie? If I didn't have Hester(GWP) I might have one of these. I hope Kali keeps on improving, keep us posted
Annie

Helen S

Poor Kali, so were you able to keep her with the pups whilst it healed? Liesel's dam had acute mastitis with a ruptured teat when the pups were just a week old and the breeder had to rear all ten of them by hand. I don't think the bitch ever went back in with them though.

Helen S

weima

I have known 2 Weimaraners who have had acute mastitis & one of their teats burst open Sad

Very unpleasant.

Claire

OMG that is horrendous !!! Thank goodness you got to her swiftly. Is there anything that can be done to avoid this from happening or is it just one of those things? I'm very glad to hear she has recovered, must have given you one hell of a scare.

weima

I'm paranoid about mastitis so am checking teats all the time. You can usually tell if there will be a problem as the teat goes hard & warm & the pups don't suck from it cos it's sour. You have to strip it out like a cow which is quite painful for the bitch.

kalico

It was Penny who helped deliver the pups! Small world, eh? Penny handles Kali for us on grouse counts etc.

I checked Kali's teats every morning for signs of hardness/redness etc..as usual that morning all was well..the deterioration was frightening..my boss said he had never seen anything quite like it. The pups werent able to be near Kali due to the severity of her condition and the fact that she was so gravely ill. The Vets werent holding out much hope for her in the early days. On the second morning, her temperature, despite having been on a drip the night before was 106.

On the plus side, the pups were almost fully weaned when this happened, Kali was still feeding them briefly a few times a day, but they were all eating well apart from this.

The biggest boy went to his new home a couple of days ago...he weighed 14lbs 9oz!!

BritAnnie

Do you or your boss think that the pups having just been weaned had any relationship to Kali's illness?

kalico

That's the strange thing..i had begun weaning the pups at just over 3w..so it had been a gradual process..i felt that feeding all 10 was a real drain on Kali and the pups took to weaning like ducks to water, Kali was still happy to feed them for 5mins or so a couple of times per day and her milk certainly appeared to still be plentiful..really odd..the Vet thinks that there was possibly a womb infection also..but he cant be sure about this..he said its highly unusual for mastitis to hit at the age the pups were..i spoke to Kali's breeders who told me that the same had happened to Kali's mother when her pups were the same age. Coincidence i guess.

The safest thing now for Kali is to be spayed..we are planning on doing this in the spring.

DesO'Neile

Thankfully, up to now, this isn't a problem I have had to deal with but I had an interesting thing happen a few months ago. Friends had a huge litter, predominately bitches. I offered to post details on the various sites I visit. They said thanks and I waited for the details. By the time all the pups had been placed it was obvious they didn’t require my services but recently I had an interesting conversation with them. They were worried that I might include details of how many years they had been trying for this litter and how much difficulty that had getting the bitch in pup and thus put people off buying the bitch pups. Obviously not everybody believes in coincidence!

BritAnnie

Iwonder if it is just coincidence? I have always been told that a bitch producing only one pup will always do so, a bitch that has infections will continue to do so. But I heard of a bitch recently which had one pup, then went on to have a litter of 9, then another litter of 8. So are vets or breeders spinning us a line? I know that Obs & Gynae problems do tend to run in families so maybe there is some truth but maybe it doesn't always run true to form.
BA

Liz

Glad to hear Kali is OK - how frightening when it all blew up like that. Lucky the pups were more or less fully weaned at that stage.

Greyghost

Poor baby. I am so glad Kali is now on the mend. What a fright..... Shocked

Helen

It must have been a very worrying time for you! pleased to hear Kali is ok.

Helen

johnhod

Glad to hear kali is recovering. I wonder if the problem will recur in the bitches from this litter?

kalico

That is something i have also wondered..i hope not..we caught Kali as early as i hope was possible..even still the Vet said she was within hours of death. Mastitis was something i was aware of and more so because of the sheer size of the litter..yet that morning before she collapsed there was nothing abnormal about any of her glands.

My boss wanted daily pics taken of the wound site..nice..but its amazing how it has healed..it is now only about 1/2" open..but looking pink and nice.