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Crikey

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Est

War. War never changes.
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Oh man, here I am sitting and minding my own business, looking to post my first pictures on this forum, I go to ask my Mum a question and I start hearing my little dog bark (her name is Eddie, she's a Jack Russel-Chuauah mix, so she's pretty small.) My Mom, my brother and I all go quiet and listen, then the barking seems to intensify so we run downstairs and we see Eddie limp in and try to hide under my brother (who was kneeling down to see why she was limping.) She was completely shocked!

So here's the story: Eddie figured that she'd chase after the 'coon, she catches the 'coon (she usually doesn't ever catch them,) and the racoon decides that he doesn't like bein chased, so he decides to fight her... By the time my dad gets there, all he sees is a rolling ball of fur, he couldn't separate the two so he whacked it with the flashlight (one of those nice, heavy maglights) a couple of times- that succeeded in giving Eddie enough time to run off. But THEN the racoon chases after Eddie! Eddie managed to get inside and my dad chased off the racoon.
Here's the aftermath: What we were really worried about that my dad had accidentally hit Eddie with the flashlight, because that would have been bad. We thought everything was ok, but then we noticed blood on my finger. Turns out that Eddie on her left leg had three puncture marks where she has been bitted, and that'd why she was limping. Judging by the distance between the punctures, the racoon had a jaw bigger than Eddie's! My dad even said it was freakin' huge. Also, we discovered that her chest was absolutely covered with scratches, none of them seemed to have broken the skin, and she was definitly more troubled by her leg. Furthermore- my dad was bleeding! His toe had been cut somehow, first we were worried he'd been bitten or something, but then by looking at it, it looked more as if he'd smacked it against the concrete and taken off some skin.

Boy oh boy! What a night, what a night! I know this isn't relavent to plants in any way shape or form, but I figured I'd post about it. While it does suck that my dog got in to a fight, I suppose that we as people do make a pretty good environment for these racoons to get food in, and I don't like any animal to get hit with anything, but if my dad wouldn't have done it, that thing would have killed Eddie! Well, I hope that there wont be a need for any trip to the vet, the punctures weren't deep or anything, but I still hope... Anyone else had anything like this happen to their animals? We've had numerous other problems with the racoons...
 
Hello Est. I haven't had anything like this happen, but Just keep an eye on your dog. Has she had her rabies shot? Still want to keep an eye on her for infection. Puncture wounds are the worst type of wounds to have. The hole closes and traps any bacteria in the wound causeing an absess. Just keep it clean and watch for any signs of agression and the famous frotthing at the mouth if she hasn't been vacinated lately. I hope she get better soon.
 
Yeah, thanks for the warning. The punctures aren't too deep, they were bleeding for a while so I'm sure that washed away a good amount of whatever else was inside, and we put some antibiotic cream on it. She just went and got her rabies shot a little while ago, so I think she'll be fine. She had the strength to walk up the stairs and to my room this morning (and wake me up,) then jump on my bed, so I think she's quickly on the way to recovery. We, of course, will be keeping our eyes on her though. Thanks for the reply.
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Just an update for anyone interested (and this is an interesting development!) My dad decided that she should get the rabies shots just in case because, as we found out, there are cases of racoons with rabies in this area. Oh MAN, it's NUTS!

First, you need to fill out all kind of paper work, then wait for a doctor to give you the shot- nurses aren't allowed to administer the first volley of shots, apparently. Several shots need to be administered in to actual area of the wound (so in my dad's case, his big toe.) First they put 3 needles of stuff to numb his toe, then give home countless shots in his toe, one in each buttock (lol) and one in the arm! OUCH! His toe was swollen as heck! I think it was 10 ccs, including the stuff to numb his toe... And He needs to get 3 more shots in the arm over the course of a month. Crazy. But then, the alternative is risking him getting rabies, which means death. There was one girl fairly recently who survived getting rabies, but she has some pretty major brain damage. Not exactly fun stuff.
confused.gif


--Fixed a typo
 
dang... seeing your pet being attacked/having been attacked is the worst thing ever.
I have two little attack stories. I didn't see this one but I like the dog and my mom did see it...
pertty (Jack Russel) and a big breed of dog were playing when suddenly my mom sees maggie (big dog) attacking pertty. She tries to separate them but can't, she runs to get the owners, they separate them, and it's a bloody mess. They take her to the vet, and she was all shaking and stuff... then they look at her and say her leg was going to be paralyzed the rest of her life. The owners didn't really want to amputate the leg and have a three-legged dog, and decided not to amputate her leg because of that and because there was a very small chance she might have SOME movement back. ... Then they got rid of maggie (which I think was also kind of sad... but she went to a good home I think), and well what do you know, pretty recovered just fine! you can't tell anything happened to her at all.

another story... since it's so long i'll "REALLY" shorten it (riiight)
we found a small stray kitten (really cute btw... I really liked it... I named it 'bean' after a character in a book) and took it in, I gave it a flea bath (I'm NEVER, EVER, EVER doing that again. holy hell it was horrible), water, food, etc.
anyway... we had the cat in a separate room from our birds, but my birds can roam around the house and the cat saw mango (one of my birds) from far away (I think the door was a little open... we didn't think cats were that fast :p) and WOOSH it runs and catches mango! I didn't see it actually catch him, I just saw it run out the door at the speed of light, but my mom did and holy hell she was screaming like crazy. I think the whole neighborhood heard her.
anyway.... I still didn't know what the heck was going on and my mom separated them and put the cat out in the balcony. There was a bunch of feathers on the floor, and poor mango runs and hides behind a ... well... that's where their cage sits on. it's a kind of box. So I catch him, examine him, didn't see anything wrong with him, so I put him in his cage and take him to another room for safety. at first he just would not move, but would stand there looking into the distance and trembling. That really breaks your heart.
anyway... we got rid of the cat (we never wanted to keep him... but the SPCA was closed when we tried to go or something... anyway we couldn't take him for a couple of days... and we don't dislike or hold anything against him in any way.... and actually my mom was crying because we had become so attached to him and we had to get rid of him)... and after a while mango got back to his old self... THEN he began shaking his leg so we knew something was wrong. we took him to the vet, they couldn't find anything, but they gave us some antibiotics and an elizabeth's collar (they're horrible for birds btw. my other bird also had to wear one for other reasons, and she plucked her feathers... still does... although she's beginning to leave them alone) and after a while he got better.
 
Wow...that sounds like a big mess. But why did your father have to get a rabies shot if he wasn't bitten?

I hope your dog and your dad are ok.
confused.gif
I've seen possums in my back yard but never a racoon. Possums can be nasty too.
 
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]Wow...that sounds like a big mess. But why did your father have to get a rabies shot if he wasn't bitten?

Yeah, I suppose I didn't really cover that part; he went to the doctor and had it checked out and there were "suspicious markings" that could have been caused by teeth. And at that point it's definitly rather safe than sorry.

[b said:
Quote[/b] ]I hope your dog and your dad are ok.
confused.gif
I've seen possums in my back yard but never a racoon. Possums can be nasty too.

Thanks, I think they'll both be ok. Eddie is acting like nothing ever happened (and has been pretty much since the day after it happened, lol) and I'm sure that my dad will make it through the shots, however painful they may be. I imagine that possums could be just as tricky!
 
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