Hi everyone, I just joined this forum to get some help with a puppy I’m fostering.
Emma will be two weeks old tomorrow. She was rescued a few days after birth from a sad situation. Her mother, a lab/chow mix, had been chained up her whole life, and the family didn’t know she was pregnant until she gave birth. All of Emma’s littermates died, and her mom didn’t show interest in her or feed her. I’m bottle-feeding Emma until she is weaned and can be adopted.
When I took Emma in, I noticed she had hair loss and cracked, dry skin on her tail. Her left hind foot was considerably swollen with significant cracking and dryness, while her right foot was also dry and cracked but not as swollen. The vet scraped for mites but didn’t find any. Neither her feet nor her tail are painful when manipulated or gently squeezed. The vet prescribed Clavamox, which she’s been taking for five days, and recommended light massage to help circulate any lymph fluid that might be built up. However, her foot isn’t improving and may be getting slightly worse. It frequently oozes a clear/yellow substance. Despite this, Emma showed no pain, and after a second vet visit, the vet said she had never seen anything like it before and suggested we wait and see.
Emma seems healthy in every other way—no fever, no pain, very active, and even attempting to ‘play fight’ with my hand. She is eating really well, better than I expected, and seems happy and healthy.
I’m wondering if anyone has any suggestions about what might be wrong with her foot or has seen anything like it before. I’ve attached photos of both hind feet and her tail.
PHOTO 1: Left hind leg
PHOTO 2: Both hind legs (left is more swollen)
PHOTO 3: View of hind foot pads (left foot is on the right in the picture)
PHOTO 4: Hair loss on tail
PHOTO 5: The cutie
The foot may be swollen due to a bee sting, red ant bites, or spider bite. I’d use warm compresses three times a day to drain out the fluid, then apply bag balm to the pads beneath her foot. Be cautious when dealing with foot problems. Hard pad is a major sign of distemper. If your current vet is clueless, I believe you should seek guidance from another one. Waiting and seeing is not going to assist this situation.
Because the skin on the feet is so thick, mange mites can penetrate very deeply. As a result, scrapes can provide negative results when they should not.
Your veterinarian can provide you with an antifungal and antibacterial shampoo. That’ll cover all your bases…If I were you, I’d get another scrape done at a different vet.
Thanks, I’ve started using a heat compress, which appears to be helping with the crusty oozies but not the swelling. If she doesn’t better, I’ll take her to another veterinarian. But I trust my vet, who has been caring for our family’s pets for 15 years, which is why I’m concerned that she’s unsure of the cause.
Also, do you believe the tail problem is related to the feet? Insect bite/sting is a great suggestion, one I hadn’t considered because it wasn’t very localized.
I’ve had two dogs with mange, and it takes oral meds like ivermectin to clear it if it’s generalized. The shampoo is just to help cure the secondary infections. If the dog has mange mites, the skin stops functioning properly, allowing fungus and bacteria to move in. The mites themselves don’t do much except make the hair fall out; it’s the other “bugs” that make the skin flaky, weepy, and stinky. Is there an odor to the feet? Yeast infections can smell quite bad!
My little guy had all three (mites, bacteria, and yeast), and his skin looked similar to your puppy’s, though with less swelling. See the flaky stuff? That’s from the combination of issues. His scrapes came back negative occasionally too.
I’d have them scrape the tail instead of the feet…and scrape it deep. Som’things not right.
I agree with Aurelia; the tail should be scraped. If this were caused by a bug bite or sting, I don’t see how all four pads would be affected. Poor baby, I hope you get some answers soon!
