Sucre, our dog, was thrown into an unknown illness last week when we found out from the vet that he had a grass awn.
Short history: We found a lump Thursday night. Called vet on Friday. By Sat. it was baseball size and draining. Vet found a piece of plant in Surce’s skin. She was worried it would travel to his lungs and put him on pain meds and an antibiotic.
It turns out grass awns are nasty little devils that are part of a plant or a seed with a barb on it. Once it goes into the skin it can’t back out like the slivers we find in our fingers. They can travel to the lungs and cause pneumothoraxs and spine problems too. I did read that UW Madison Vet school was one of the best places to take a dog that had an awn. That made me relax a little bit.
So far Sucre is doing well. The wound is not healed, but it is no longer draining. We go back to the vet tomorrow after school. Hopefully she will declare him well.
Now, we need to rid our woods of any of the plants that cause these awns. Gaby, my friend, said she would crochet him a vest to wear!
Here are some websites in case your dogs are in the woods, or fields that may have these plants.
http://www.meanseeds.com/
http://drbarchas.com/foxtails
http://www.essfta.org/Health_Research/grass_awn.htm
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