A blood bath!

[AmandaDi]

Wow! Got up this morning to find blood all over one of my cages. Like it looked like a murder crime scene!

One of my chins either got her tail stuck or she bit it! I brought her into the vet as this was one I just couldn't patch up at home. She had to shave her tail down to really get to it, but the tip was all bloody and swollen. There was very little blood near her mouth so I couldn't see if it was from biting her tail or from just being in a bloody cage!

The vet cleaned it up good, put on silver nitrate to stop the bleeding, put on some cream and wrapped it up. She is on Metacam for a week and I have to take the bandage off tomorrow (if it lasts that long) and reapply the cream. She said ideally she would like us to warm pack it twice a day, but I dunno how well that will go over as she doesn't like to be handled much.

Have any of you had one with a tail injury? How long did it take to heal? I am leaving on Aug 4 for two weeks and not I am afraid she will break it open or something while I am gone. My friend is coming over every day to feed and water, so at least someone will be with her, but it still worries me.

I have her in the kennel right now and plan to leave her there till tomorrow afternoon in hopes of keeping this banage on if she isn't jumping all around.

Circle of finances... I sold two cages on Monday and today I spent that money at the vet! Can't win!

 

[Newt]

Oh no
Poor chinny, and poor you!

Hope your wee one recovers quickly

 

[Snickers]

I had a chin that started to chew her tail awhile ago. I put blu-kote on it it seemed to work for awhile. I took her to the vet he just cleaned it and bandaged it. She seemed to get better but started to chew her tail again. The vet ended up amputating 1/2 of her tail. I am not sure due to moving her from a middle cage to a lower cage since that is when she started to do all this. Her and her cage mate was moved back to their original cage which she never chewed her tail again. I am not sure if it is a coincidence or not amputing and moving back to old cage.

 

[AmandaDi]

The vet said worse case scenario she would have to amputate. I pray this was just a fluke. Did your chin chew it at the tip or somewhere on the sides?

The chin in the cage next to hers died a few weeks ago so that cage is no longer there. I sold it on Moday.... it would suck if that stressed her out enough to cause her to do this! I mean the cage is melamine and only has a little window on the side that use to look into the other cage.

 

[Snickers]

She chewed it at the tip. I think it was due to stress.

 

[chechinchillas]

I wonder if there could be any other physical reason a chin would do this? I have 200 chins and have never had one do this (knock on wood). I haven't heard about it very often either, so I am guessing it's not very common. I just wonder if something could be irritating their tail that's makes them do it?

 

[AmandaDi]

Update for today. She didnt bother the bandage at all! I would have thought that if she was stressed, she would have continued to try to chew at it...... yes? no?

I took the bandage off as told by the vet. The wound looked good, not irritated or swollen. I did a warm cloth compress for about 2 min... the cloth started to cool down. I put the cream on it and crossed my fingers. About 20 min later there was blood all over the wall next to her. I didn't see any of it on her face though. I think she swung her tail into the wall or something and it popped the scab. I went ahead and put more cream on it and put on another bandage. Gonna try again tomorrow but I think I might just go ahead and bandage it right back up. Its never gonna heal if it keeps bleeding!

 

[AmandaDi]

The bandage didn't stick well enough and by 12:30am when I checked on her, it was coming off and there was more blood on the wall. Pretty sure she just flopped her tail into the melamine wall and it busted it open yet again.

So off came the bandage and she went back into the pet carrier. I feel bad leaving her there but I foresee her being there for the next week or so. I put just the cream on last night and crossed my fingers. This morning, no blood and still cream on the tip. Did another warm compress with a cloth, put on more cream and Im crossing my fingers again. The wound actually looks pretty good, so I am hopefull that this will heal soon!

Gotta go back in in a few hours for pain meds and then will do another warm compress tonight.

 

[qtpie61282]

I have a sapphire male from ryersons who started attacking his tail whenever I put him near a female....or caged near other males. He literally can't be in the view of any chins or he has a fit and takes it out on his tail.

He was vetted a few times for it, put the cream on it and even made an e-collar small enough for him to prevent him from chewing.

Now that he is finally out of sight from the other chins, he does well. His tail has healed and hair has grown back for the most part. At any point if I move his cage or pull the barrier down from between him and the one next to him, he starts back up again.
So weird...
Hope your chins tail heals and she stops chewing it! I wonder if it is stress that causes it. Stress would make sense in my situation.

 

[AmandaDi]

The longer this goes the more I think it was just a freak accident. She shows NO signs of being a chewer. I would think that with all the stuff we have to keep doing it would only continue to stress her if stress caused her to chew... but yet she hasn't bothered her tail at all since we took the bandage off.

 

[Spoof]

I hope it was a freak accident too!

I came home from a week long trip to picture #1 in various degrees of savagery on about a dozen chins. I freaked out pretty good, called around and couldn't find anything conclusive. Some of them were so bad It was a 1" band around the middle of the tail or the entire tip.

After making the calls I noticed a ceiling panel had dropped a bit and checked it and found mold. Got to looking around and found it in the walls/floor too. I packed up every chin, moved them into the house and ripped out the ceiling, walls and the floor. Took 16 hours but I got it all replaced.

The last picture is one of them two weeks later. The wounds healed really fast, and none of the chins chewed the fur on the tail, just the skin/meat on the tail itself. Most bizarre thing I've seen in 15 years. Only thing I could figure is it was an allergic reaction to the mold.

What really got me is that building was less than six months old at the time. Apparently it is really common for linoleum to sweat in the south and mold anything underneath it and around it.

I combat this now by keeping a lot more air movement onto the walls and floor/ceiling than I normally would in a chin barn. So far this year it has worked well and I have not had a reappearance except inside one of my a/c units. Also never had an a/c unit go moldy. The deep south is just special like that I guess.

 

[AmandaDi]

Oh my goodness Spoof! I will try to get a pic of her tail tonight. It is litterally right at the very tip.
I am glad you found your source and the chins healed quickly! I leave a week from tomorrow so I am praying for a quick heal!

 

[AmandaDi]

Alright so still no new blood since I have been holding her in the pet carrier. Thursday is 1 week. The vet wanted to check her out at the week mark....

First I was going to go because I was all freaked out... Then I was like nah, its looking good so I don't want to stress her out if I don't have to... Now I'm like what should I do? What if what I think looks good doesn't really look good? What if I take her and it stresses her more then I turn around and leave on Sunday for two weeks?

Advice? Take her or no?

 

[AmandaDi]

I was on vacation for two weeks so I didn't get to update.

I took Skylar in on that Thursday 1 week mark. The vet said she was healing wonderfully and she was happy with the progress.

That Saturday night at Midnight, Skylar busted it back open again! She was bleeding a lot again and I could see it was just right at the tip again. Obviously I was stressing bc I was leaving that next morning. I bandaged it all up and my friend came by the next two days to check on her and be sure it was still bandaged. I was afraid she wouldn't survive the weekend bc she was really going into shock the night I bandaged it.

That Tuesday another friend came over and took her to the vet for me so they could rebandage and check on her. Then again on Friday. I got home late Tuesday and have been really busy so I haven't messed with her.

Tomorrow I am taking the bandage off and will try the warm compress healing process all over again. Really hoping that having it totally bandaged for so long is going to be the key. We shall see. At 10 years old I am just happy she survived all the stress!

Gotta love my friends who went out of their way to check on her daily and take her to the vet for me while I was away!

 

[ChonchoMom]

Wow, You have been through a whole lot. I hope your chin is doing better today. That would be very stressful even for me. !

 

[HolyBegeebers]

I'm glad to hear things are getting better. I agree with what you said about helpful friends! They can definitely be a blessing.

 

[AmandaDi]

Back to the vet tomorrow... ugh!

Took the bandage off and again at midnight I found her bleeding. It hadn't been long as there wasn't a lot, but it was on its way. I rebandaged again and decided to keep it till I could see the exotic specialist on Tuesday.

I feel like it won't scab and heal properly if it is bandaged ... but it wont heal if she continues to bang it and it bleeds! She goes into shock so quickly that I worry one day I wont find her bleeding fast enough....

 

[Riven]

Could the bones at the tip of the tail be broken? If it's causing her pain she could be chewing it to get rid of the pain...

 

[AmandaDi]

Riven, The vet said the bone looks fine and it isn't showing much at all. She doesn't appear to be chewing at it at all, just flopping it against the walls!