Two Vets

Poppea - Westie cross fruit bat at 3 months

A day for two vet visits, both successful but with very different outcomes. First up, Poppea's visit to the town vet to get her stitches out. Being a bit of a drama queen as dogs go, I was expecting her to squeal and scream at every stitch, and was joking that we might have to warn up anyone sitting in the waiting room to make sure they didn't de-camp, thinking that the vet was torturing the animals that morning. In the event, no such worries. The vet had me lift Pops up onto the table and then stand her up holding her front legs and head/chest off the ground, so that her belly was stretched out in his full view. He tinkered around out of sight with Poppea barely twitching but looking at me a bit anxiously. "OK, all done" he said. He'd nipped out all of her stitches in a few minutes and brave soldier Pops had not whimpered, squeaked or squealed at all. Proud of her.

Pirate enjoys a good brush out.

Then this afternoon, not so much fun. RIP then, poor aul' Pirate, former diseased, emaciated stray cat with lots of bits missing. We had him put down today. Never the most handsome cat, we called him 'Road-crash chic'. He never did get over the missing eye, open to infections thing and recently picked up a bad infection of the chest, face, possible whole head, Poor aul' sod. Didn't really get any good numbers in life's lottery, but at least we gave him 18 months of being warm, dry, safe and fed. Now he's in a bit of garden where the golden autumn beech leaves shade him and the slanting evening sun lights up the grass and his memorial 'rock'. We'll miss you, Pi.

As for you fellow chicken keepers, when you are carving out your Hallowe'en pimpkins, remember the chickens. We all knew that pumpkin seeds and innards were a natural womer, didn't we (?). I had certainly heard it from 'people' but I did wonder whether it was one of those old wives' tales, with no grounding in real science. Up stepped biochemist/chicken nuts 'Martin Woods Farm' with the following.

"If you're planning on carving a pumpkin this Hallowe'en, don't forget your hens! They will adore all the insides of the pumpkin and, as an extra bonus, the seeds act as a natural wormer for chickens.

Pumpkins are part of the Curcurbita family and the seeds contain a naturally occurring chemical called Curcurbitacin which can paralyse worms in the digestive tract (I love it when my 2 passions, chickens and science, come together!). As well as this, pumpkins are also a great source of Vitamin A, Vitamin E and Vitamin C! What a winner! Make sure your birds have grit available to them to help digest the seeds and, as with all treats, feed them in moderation and as late in the afternoon as possible."

So now you know.

...on the other hand...

On the other hand, the reason Haggis might be full of beans all of a sudden, might be that he has survived another Burns Night without getting eaten. We actually got some (haggis) to taste this year - Mum and Dad's eyes bigger than their bellies. It was delicious and we wolfed it down.

Ah well, H, you can relax for another year.

Young Diamond was round last night having just brough Rags to the vets which has opened next to the Home for the Bewildered just at the back of us. This is the first time we've seen him since about June 2009, when Diamond started on this medical journey and had to be careful around getting scratched due to the risk of infections. He's spent most of that time on his "holidays" lodging with a couple of chums of Diamond's out on the London Road.

He doesn't change, the old Devil, although he's mellowed a bit and now leaves off trying to mount Haggis as soon as the H objects (rather than keepin' on keepin' on). However, it seems, although he now does very little to annoy me, I persist in grumbling and growling from a handy human lap as soon as he walks too close. Old habits die hard, but the humans are saying it might be me issued with the ASBO next, and Rags's be rescinded.

Deefski

Farewell to Meggie

Today we are sorry to bring you the sad news of the passing away of Megan. Uncomfortable and off her food for a few days now, Mum and Dad, fearing the worst, made an appointment at the vet's. The short version of the story is that her suffering was a result of acute kidney failure, so that the tough decision had to be made, and she was put to sleep tonight.

Dad was pleased that it was himself there and also pleased that the vet on duty was old friend and vet to Megan from the moment Mum and Dad brought her home as an 8 week old pup, John F. That was 13 years ago.

For those of you who have never been there it was a very dignified and gentle exit. She was up on the bench with Dad cradling her head and a vet nurse steadying her body. John shaved a small area of leg, readied the syringe, then drew back a small curl of blood, and pushed in the pink liquid. Megan never flinched or changed her expression at all, just carried on looking at Dad. In no more than 10 seconds, almost before the last of the syringe-full went in, she relaxed into Dad's and the nurse's hands.

Dad left the room to settle the bill, while the nurse out back wrapped Megan in a blanket, and then rather than bring her through the waiting room, walked round the side and met Dad outside. Dad carried the small bundle back to car and brought her home to Mum. We were allowed to sniff the bundle, but this was then laid to rest quickly in the orchard still in its blanket.

Mum and Dad hope that all their animals are granted such good, full and happy life and then as dignified and painless an end. You can't really do more for a friend and pet than that. Goodbye then the Megster - we will miss you a lot. I'm sure that all your many friends and admirers will wish you rest in peace.

Farewell

Deefer

Oooowooo - OW OW OW!

I'm in pain, and nobody cares! The humans just keep looking at me all sad, and gently picking me up and feeding me treats and uttering sympathetic noises but nobody REALLY cares. I have had to go to the vets for my annual jabs, which made me squeak, but Dad just told the vet not to worry as I'm a known drama queen.

I was then OK in the car on the way home via some obscure farm cottages in Eastling (something to do with allotments), bouncing around the car and shouting at any passing dogs, and I was OK while Dad trimmed our bums and eyes.

But when the humans decided to go buy a Christmas tree I suddenly realised I was in pain, and I've been woosing around ever since, stiff shouldered and stiff necked, whimpering with pain at every opportunity. It Hurts me so! It's not fair. Dad says we'll rest it and lift me everywhere and see how we are in the morning.

Make it go away! OWWWWWWWWWWWWW!

Deefski (Poor wounded soldier)

Autumn in the Garden

While we've all been rushing about dealing with Daimond's "release" and Meggie's vet visits, Autumn has quietly come to the garden. We have some lovely clumps of white cyclamen, planted more in hope than in certainty, from small dig-ups taken from the pud-lady last year. Mum and Dad had thought they'd faded and died with the up-rooting, but here they are flourishing in the wild-stawberry-y bit at the base of the birch.

We also have many roses doing a late flush after the drought and a serious amount of dead heading, and a good crop of apples (goldens and coxes) and half a dozen good sized quinces turning yellow. Also coming out is a nice clump of Sedum spectabile, actually the two surviving separate halves of one plant which Haggis liked to sit in the middle of, in his youth,

Dad has been away in Stoke for a night picking up some kind of works award (zzzzzz) but is now back, and tonight it's Mum's turn - off on a "leaving do" for a colleague. What rock and roll lifestyles we lead, to be sure.

Dad nips Meggie back to the vet's for a check up and Meg takes the opportunity to bleed onto the vet's table from her pad-scar - not before or since, just for the couple of minutes she's on the vet's table. Other than that we are declared good to go.

Have a great weekend y'all. We are eagerly awaiting the arrival of some video footage taken on the narrow boating holiday, and now saved by Mr Silverwood, to CDs. Happy memories.

Deefski

Home for the Bewildered

The Home for the Bewildered out the back, finally finished, is now accepting "customers". A bevvy of carers and nurses has arrived, and the first residents are in. We watch developments with interest. The Management are saying that locals can get a guided tour of the building. The Angel B says she is going to get her dirtiest clompy boots on and tread some mud into their new furnishings, see how they like it! Go Angel!

Diamond is home. We met John this afternoon walking home to his own house, from having just delivered Di into the tender care of fiersome Stockton-on-Tees friend of the fambly, Joan (quake, tremble). House has to be kept really really really clean because Di's immune system is still under par, so there must be absolute minimum risk of infection. One gets the impression Joan is the one to do it! No Ragworth allowed yet, so he's still at his "hotel" and no little white furry dogs yet either. Good to have you home though Diamond!

As promised, some recent Cambria pics. First a view you'd never see unless you owned one probably and had it up in dry dock to scrape barnacles off the bottom. This is taken with a wide angle under the port bow. You can just see the aft end of one of the new inner planks. the pale grey paint is the only "original" wood preserved in the restoration - the very bottom boards, pickled in salty mud since at least 1970 and almost certainly well before. At some stage in the barge's 103 years the underside may have been "doubled" (covered with a new layer of planking over (outside) the old) but we have no way of knowing, and these boards may actually be truly original 1903 wood.

Next, again with the wide angle, is a nice shot of the framing under the port bow. Finally is one of the hold with Dad's colleague Richard wandering about for scale. Running along the top of the shot above the camera and out to the right ( port side, as we're looking aft from starb'd bow) are the 2 new, 90 foot long "marjin planks", which form the sides of the hold hatches, take the hatch coamings, and support the long-ways, short "carling" beams.

All good stuff. Meggie, meanwhile, has spent a day at the vets having her feet poked and prodded. Turned out she had no grass-dart (which had been a possibility) and a small pink growth on her pad (which has been there ages and is just part of being an old girl) which might have been causing pain was cut away and cauterised, and sent away for biopsy. So she's on anti-biotics and mild pain killers, and has to wear a lamp shade for a few days. Wonder what is the price of NOT taking her pic for my blog....... mmmm... perhaps I prefer to live long and be poor.

Deefer

Shaken, not stirred

"You know your dogs" - it's an expression many dog owners use between each other; the suggestion that humans are so close to we dogs (we are like their children) that they can immediately sense when we are not "normal". The smallest nuance, the tiniest flinch, a change of stance or gait which would be imperceptible to anyone else, gives a clue to the owner that the dog might be unwell, ill, in pain or just uncomfortable.

Big changes, then, are easy - "Problem" writ large, shouted from the rooftops. Hence Dad's instant concern at the vets when the H started shivering with (?) fear as soon as he was placed on the vets table for his exam, and how he relaxed as soon as he was taken off. As far as anyone knows, he's not had any traumas at the vets, not been hurt or upset in any way - Mum or Dad have always been there, so they'd know.

Once, as they say, is an accident.... twice is carelessness... and you know where it goes from there.

Tonight Dad is concerned at the bit of a limp Megan is showing, and picks her up to have a good poke about between her toes and pads, probing with gentle fingers looking for sore bits, the tops of embedded thorns, chunks of hard mud among the fur, bits of ice etc. She's 12 and a half and it's an action we've all been trained to accept since puppy hood - we get flipped on our backs and we have to accept human fingers between our toes, round our eyes and ears, in our mouths. Far easier to get a 9 week old pup to accept it than a fully grown, proud adult dog!

The dog-trainers call it the "alpha-roll". We must know our place. We must know that humans are "alpha" and we are at best "Beta" (2nd best). If a human wants to poke and prod us or roll us over and tickle our belly, just like if they take our bone away, we have to know they are boss, and accept it, trusting them not to hurt us, and/or to give the bone back when it suits them. We, all three have had this and it's part of life.

So, having done this to Meggie a thousand times in their 12+ years together, with no reaction, he is surprised when she suddenly starts shivering just like Haggis on the vet's table. She is most unhappy and upset and doesn't stop trembling till she's put back upright on the floor. Now he's really confused. What's changed? What's causing this?

Later, to reassure himself, he lies Meggie, on her back, on his lap, while we watch some TV, but this time he only strokes her belly and chin, doesn't go near her feet. She's cool with that, relaxes and falls asleep.

What human can understand what goes on in our heads? It's a worrying time.......

Deefer

The Lady with the Lump

Noooo... not Florence Nightingale - I said "lump" not "lamp". This is, though, a tale of sickness and ministeringAngels of Mercy, plus maybe a Drama Queen as well.

The lump is mine. Half way along my spay scar Dad has noticed a small (thumb-nail sized) hard lump come up, and suspects it may be a hernia (rupture), maybe where the abdomen wall is not fully mended, so we're back off to the lovely Larissa, lady vet who did the original op.

Lady Vet is concerned too, but stands me on her table and pokes, prods, pulls and palpates the area. She is now relieved. It is "almost certainly not a hernia" she says, because it feels detached from the muscle wall, instead it is in the sub-cutaneous fat layer. Probably a hard bit of scar tissue, she says, as a reaction to one of the internal stitches.

She also says (probably too much information here) that when it is a hernia, you can generally slide your finger back up inside the hole.... Oy! That's my guts you're discussing, you humans. She shows Dad how to stand me up the right way so that whole area relaxes, and then feel the size of it, and that it's loose from the muscle wall. Keep an eye, she says, and check it twice a week, make sure it's not getting any bigger - it should fade away by itself.

Allegedly

Am I free to go, now Doc?

Deefer

Back to reality

Ah well, holiday over and holiday write-up also over. In reality, of course, we have been back 10 days and are now well back into the routine of home and walks, Mum and Dad working etc. Tonight we meet up with (through the garden gate) our 2 mates, liver coloured pointers just up this road, and we're sympathising that one of them is wearing one of those plastic lamp shades. Not anything we've so far had to endure, but read on.

Apparently he is not bothered at all by it, but has no conception of the width of it or of the damage hard plastic can do to house paint when propelled by several stone of bouncing pointer. Their Dad says he has no paint or wall paper left at between 2 and 3 foot high, which equates to pointer neck and head height. The dog had had some "lumps removed" and needs the lampshade to prevent him nibbling the stitches.

I am off to the vets tomorrow myself, to get "done". Not sure what this means but the worst aspect of it seems to be that I've had my supper tonight after our walk but that's now it till I've been sorted - total "fast" - not even a sweetie, and not even any water after 11pm. This seems very drastic, but I gather it's for my own good. Dad's explained all this of course, but I'm a dog, so I have to pretend it's all Greek to me......

Deefer

Farewell to Mississippi

Another sad one, I'm afraid. Mississippi even from kittenhood has had uncertain health. With her brother (Louisiana), she shared a strange musculature and tail formation - her tail was only half the normal length, the last few vertebrae were vestigial, curling round to form a small knob, her tail held downwards like a Springer Spaniel, and her back legs always slightly weak and carried low, so that she had a stoop at the back end like an alsatian.

Well lately she's been showing signs that the back end was degenerating (front end, shoulders, neck, head, front legs always looked fine), and she's been less and less mobile, recently unable to get in and out of the cat flap and then, finally, unable to get in and out of the litter tray. Accidents were frequent.

So Mum and Dad have made the tough decision and now her little life is over. She is buried in the new "woodland glade" garden. She will have a little marker of woodruff (Gallium). We will all miss her - she was a very friendly cat and we loved her.

Deefer

Bye Bye Felix

Felix runs out of lives and luck today. His bulging cheek diagnoses out as a big tumour, and Dad makes the decision to have him put to sleep while he's still under sedative for the examination. The Vet says it is a good decision and that she'd have done the same if it was her own cat.

Dad collects him and brings him home after work, and prepares a burial hole in the old chicken run alongside the damson bush. When Mum gets home they bury him, still in the towel from the basket in which he went to the Vet. It's a shady spot down there among the fruit trees, so they will plant suitable plants to mark the spot - probably anenomes and woodruff

Felix had a good, healthy, long and happy life, and a dignified, pain free end. You can't really ask for more than that for a cat, can you?

I was confused and curious when the basket came home, and had to go have a look and a sniff where Dad put it on the terrace table. I couldn't understand why Felix would not come out, and I sniffed him again as he was being carried down the garden. He was a good friend and an endless source of chase games and larking to me, especially when I was younger - suddenly breaking into a scampering run up the garden or up the stairs, easily outpacing me, especially on the slippery laminate floors.

You were a good mate, Felix, and I'll miss you.

Deefs

In Safe Hands

It is not looking good for Felix our poor old hand-me-down, rescue, discovered-in-a-dustbin-when-a-kitten, black and white cat. He is currently at our very capable vets and will be sedated and examined in the morning, but it's almost certain he has a cheek/throat/nasal tumour and will probably not be reversed out of anaesthetic. Don't give up on him yet - there's an outside chance it's a treatable abcess, but don't get your hopes up either.

He's had a good life, Bless him, after an unlikely start. Mum's sister, "Mrs Silverwood" found him in the dustbin at the old Shell filling station in Rainham, where she used to work. He was found along with his litter-mates, in a very sorry state. She passed them to the Cats' Protection League (more power to their elbows - a bunch of heroes if ever there was!) but asked, when they'd done what they needed to do to return them to health, wean them and neuter them, could she have the little black and white one back.

Years later, when they moved to Ireland, it was Foot and Mouth year, so no livestock could go with them, and we inherited him. Then when Diamond wanted an affectionate cat he fitted the bill, so Felix went to live with her for a while. She, as you know, then got Asbo (Rags), the dog, and the two loved being pup and cat together. But then Asbo started to get a bit to heavy on poor Felix, who got upset and too anxious to go on the floor. So we rescued Felix again and he's been with us since - and is now approaching his 14th year.

Wish him luck, poor old fella. He's going to need it
Deefer

Oxtail!

Dad has a day's holiday, so we are being spoiled again. We head for the Forest, entering at the Jacket's Field entrance and exploring the paths used on the Deer Walk in October, and passing through the "sleeping" rutting stand, now green with newly emerging bluebell shoots. It's a good walk - warm and sunny.

Dad must shop, and returns from the local "proper, old-fashionned" butcher (Barkaway's - good name for a butcher from a dog's point of view! We like this butcher anyway because he happily gives Dad bones for us) this time with a kilo of oxtail, which he steals a chunk each for us out of before it goes in the freezer. We have never had this before and it's love at first sight! We chew, gnaw and slurp deliciously for nearly an hour on them before reducing them to small meatless cylinders of vertebra

Then it's off to the vet for annual boosters - at least for Meg, Haggis and Mississippi the cat. Not me this time, but I go along for the ride, and I'm allowed to stand on the weighing scales - a trim 6.48 kgs! Just over half what the solid old bird Megan weighs!

Deefer

Dash to the Vet's

Mum was having a nightmare morning. It's never a good sign - Mum is rather like the Dowager Duchess Megan when it comes to mornings. Mornings are for lying in bed luxuriating while reading the papers and being brought cups of tea by those of a male, early riser persuasion. Felix had pee'd up a door post in the kitchen, and a spreading puddle of pee was taking over the kitchen floor.

Time was pressing on towards "going off to work" time. Dad was already long gone in the main car. Megan decided that Mum trying to empty the sink so she could fill a basin with bleachy water, was a good time to poke Mum's calves with her (Meg's) nose in an "I want attention, or at least my water bowl filled up" manner. I chose that moment to sneak past Mum and raid the cat food bowls. I got shoo'd out, I thought rather harshly, and headed upstairs to persecute the H, who was on the put-me-up bed in the spare room. Mum lifted the cat bowls to clean the floor, much to the loud protest of Missi, who already had her nose in hers

Mum sorted the floor, replaced the cat bowls and, having long since run out of time for a dog walk, called us down for a farewell "sweetie" (= dog treat). Half way down the stairs, she noticed me stop running and go to try to attack my own cheek with a front paw (not anything you want to try on a steep flight of stairs). I was struggling for breath, and had started choking. Mum tried to look in my mouth, but I'm a wriggly perisher at the best of times, and she couldn't see anything. There was no immediate danger of me choking to death. Mum, still in "dog walk" casuals, grabbed me, threw me in the 2CV and headed for the vet, while I struggled to dislodge the foreign body, which was squeaking rather like rubber on teeth.

Luckily the 2CV started obediently (Mum HATES that car, so if it hadn't it would surely have been berated with a heavy rock, so Dad was releived at this!) and soon we were at the vets. First our man John couldn't see anything but Mum insisted he look closer, as I'd still been squeaking as recently as at the reception. They found, in the end, the pictured small cylinder of soft plastic / rubber wedged on the inside of the gap between my right canine and the tooth in front, John whipped it out, and we all relaxed.

For being so "bold" I got an anti-inflammatory jab ("Meep!"), and Dad got a text which relayed all this misfortune and ended "and all I've got to look forward to is this chuffin' soup!". The humans are on diets, so lunch is no longer bacon butties, cakes and all the good things in life).

The offending item is the rubber foot from the laminator, which had been lying on the spare bed...... I have (of course) no idea how it got wedged between my teeth.

Deefer

(not a puppy any more so I don't chew stuff, honest)

Brave Girl

Big sighs of relief round here tonight. Megster has been relieved of her grass dart and now stands a chance of proper recovery. Dad had been worried - 9 days of salt water foot-baths and antibiotics, and she still had an obvious abcess. So tonight they were all off back to the vets. poor Meggie - she used to love the vet's, and ran happily to the door, nosing the door, keen to get inside and see her beloved John, our vet since Megs was a pup. Not any more!

Dad lifted Meg onto the table and a vet-nurse (not Dad's Finnish dog-wrangler this time!) grabbed her back end, while the vet muzzled her, and Dad held her chin up and leg extended. John poked, prodded, teased and squeezed, while brave Meggie shivvered - obviously upset, but not about to crack and show these humans any defeat - no growling, no yipping or crying and no trying to bite! Suddenly the abcess gave and the dart plipped out onto the examination table.

Everybody relaxed - even Megan immediately seemed to know it was all over, but she wasn't about to wag her tail till the muzzle was off, and she was back on the floor and walked back round to the friendly receptionist who gave her 4 (count them!) treats.

So now we hope Meg will be able to get quickly and cleanly better. As for me - extremely worried when Dad loaded up Meg and left me and the H behind in the house, and delighted when a few minutes later Mum came home, but I suppose I better tear up this formal complaint written in haste. We know they do all these horrible things to us for our own good really. Just doesn't always seem like that!

Get well soon, Meggie!

Deefer

Owwooooo... Poorly Girl

Woe woe and thrice woe!

Woe is me. Although I seem OK to Dad as he breakfasts and then heads off to work, by the time Mum gives me the morning walk I am feeling a bit miserable and acting strange, circling and distracted as if decidedly uncomfortable. Back indoors I refuse breakfast. For a dog that will normally fight to win all three breakfasts, this is a major symptom and Mum is very worried. When she picks me up I have a little go at shivering - more of a full body tremor, so the humans decide to whizz me off to the vets

An appointment is booked and Dad drives back from work to taxi me. Of course I am so pleased to see Dad, I charge round the side of the house and bounce around on my back legs, like a fully healthy pup (oops), and lunge in a convincing manner at a proffered "sweetie". Mum growls - "You better not be faking it, you little rat!". Such sympathy. She even suggests that maybe I have a spelling test at school today and am trying to get out of it. (The voice of experience, Mum?)

Meg was found yesterday with a very skanky smelly version of that big knuckle bone you can see in our "carnivorous" post a few days ago. The same one - and you know how hot it's been in Kent! The humans, being mean, usually throw these away after a few hours of gnawing, but we managed to disappear this one, laying it down in the bone cellar to mature a while. The humans do not know where this is..... :-))

I am quiet enough and mopey in the car that you'd know all is not well. Ah well, I am off to the vets, where a very nice locum lady pokes, prods, manipulates limbs, takes temperature (ooh! They don't like it up 'em!), and can't find anything specific wrong. So I get an antibiotic jab and wormer tablets and Dad gets separated from a wad of money (He's not complaining too much!) and we return home. I am, incidentally, 6.8 kgs.

Mum opts to work from home to supervise me (We love that broad-band) and later that day Dad texts to ask how we are. Mum texts back "Lying out in the sun". Dad replies "Hmmmm - Exhausted from all that play-acting, I expect"

The Nerve!

Deefer the Really Sick