Poor Panda!
Yesterday I was going to work Panda, but when I removed her fly mask I was rather shocked to find that her face was swollen! I immediately tried to find a reason for it and attempted to call the Vet, but it turned out he was in surgery at the time and it took a half hour or more before I was able to get a hold of him. Fortunately apart from being swollen Panda seemed perfectly fine, alert and attentive and nonplussed. She even ate a bit of granola bar I offered her. She was breathing a bit fast, but it might have been that the swelling had restricted her airway slightly, but not enough to be a problem.
I gave her two grams of Bute (I believe the technical name is phenylbutazol[sp]), but once I got a hold of the vet he suggested a third (thankfully we had the paste stuff and she takes such things pretty well). His thought was that she managed to find a nasty but and got stung or bit and it caused the swelling, probably on the right side as that portion of her face was slightly more swollen than the other. He suggested three more grams that evening and call him with her progress.
Thankfully the swelling came down a bit (though she was still quite puffy) that evening. We still gave her the Bute and made sure that there weren't any painful spots that might indicate where she was bitten or stung (there were a three very small scabs on the left side of her face, but since that was the less swollen side we figured that probably wasn't it.
This morning I came out and her face was perfectly fine (thankfully!), but gave her two grams of soaked Bute tablets in some rice bran just to be cautious and called the vet again to inform him of the progress. I asked what else we could do in case she got into something like that again (she is a curious one) and in addition to the Bute he said that we could give her some benadryl (yes, that allergy medicine). Because of her weight and size (she's just over 15hh, but drafty and something like 1350lbs) he suggested 10-12 of the pills three times a day would help as well (how to get her to take the pills I'm not quite sure).
So that was the adventure with Panda, hopefully we won't have to deal with something like that again, but at least now we'll be a little more prepared!
I gave her two grams of Bute (I believe the technical name is phenylbutazol[sp]), but once I got a hold of the vet he suggested a third (thankfully we had the paste stuff and she takes such things pretty well). His thought was that she managed to find a nasty but and got stung or bit and it caused the swelling, probably on the right side as that portion of her face was slightly more swollen than the other. He suggested three more grams that evening and call him with her progress.
Thankfully the swelling came down a bit (though she was still quite puffy) that evening. We still gave her the Bute and made sure that there weren't any painful spots that might indicate where she was bitten or stung (there were a three very small scabs on the left side of her face, but since that was the less swollen side we figured that probably wasn't it.
This morning I came out and her face was perfectly fine (thankfully!), but gave her two grams of soaked Bute tablets in some rice bran just to be cautious and called the vet again to inform him of the progress. I asked what else we could do in case she got into something like that again (she is a curious one) and in addition to the Bute he said that we could give her some benadryl (yes, that allergy medicine). Because of her weight and size (she's just over 15hh, but drafty and something like 1350lbs) he suggested 10-12 of the pills three times a day would help as well (how to get her to take the pills I'm not quite sure).
So that was the adventure with Panda, hopefully we won't have to deal with something like that again, but at least now we'll be a little more prepared!