Thursday, May 31, 2007

Looks like we might have an issue


Yesterday I took Ash to the vet because I had some concerns regarding some excess discharge he's been having from his eyes. Turns out the eyes are fine, I'm just treating with terramycin for awhile, but the vet pointed out that Ash is retaining his puppy teeth. Both of his upper adult canines are coming in right NEXT to the puppy canines. SInce the adult canines are just beginning to emerge I'm keeping my fingers crossed that they will still push the baby teeth out. The vet said they should be out in the next 2 - 3 weeks, if not they may need to be surgically extracted! It may also affect his bite. So far he has a scissor bite but it does look like on his right side the upper and lower canine are not even. Hopefully this will all correct itself and I can stop fussing! BUT his first show is 4 weeks away and I'm wondering how this will play a role in all of it?????

16 comments:

Kate said...

I *think* that's pretty common. I remember Traci and I freaking out about it once or twice with ours.

Baledwr said...

Give him bones to chew on and work at wiggling them. If they don't get looser really soon - pull the suckers. Retained baby teeth happen all the time but I'm a bit paranoid as Duncan (Kota's grandpa)actually ended up damaging the enamal on the adult canine tooth when she waited (and the deciduous tooth broke and started to decay) and then the adult tooth broke at about 6 months. Didn't cause an issue finishing him but would have as a special.

Hugs to Ash-baby! Hopefully chewies and mommy-work will do the trick.

Traci said...

Yep, Sedona held onto hers for a while too... I don't remember when she lost it. I bought bones for it, and no sooner than I did that, the tooth came out.
Just keep an eye on it :)

Fox lady said...

Thanks Mandy- scary thoughts about adult canines breaking, crap!
So I'm off to get some hard bones and a wiggle I will do, but how soon is soon if they don't budge?
Congratulations on the new job- money and showing dogs definately go hand in hand=)

Jeri said...

Yup just watch it. A friend here had to have a bunch of baby teeth pulled, not just the canines...she erred on the side of caution rather than risk messing up the bite. *shrug* But I'd give it another little while and see what happens. :)

Kim said...

I heard Mandy say knuckle bones do the trick. I think that's what we got for Casper and they took quite a few weeks to loosen up. Crazy looking four fanged beast.

CardiLover said...

Lib and Ef lost theirs really early and actually were sort of toothless for a bit. Savannah waited until the last possible minute. Her littermate's owner actually had hers pulled. I just made sure that she had lots of different textures of chewies, plied with peanut butter occasionally to initiate immense chewing. The other thing I've done with all of them is wet and freeze old wash cloths and then give them the frozen cloth out of the freezer to chew on. Seems like it sort of grabs the teeth and does a bit of wiggling as they suck/chew on them.
Knock on wood, but I haven't had to pull any teeth or tape any ears yet. Woo hoo!

Kady Cannon said...

As the others said, retained baby canines are quite common in Cardigans. Ethan's mom Zoe had to have hers pulled.

I wonder about your vet saying "surgically" removed. It hasn't seemed to be a big deal to my vet to just yank them out.

Fox lady said...

Yes, surgically meaning putting him under G.A., and he also said that he didn't feel comfortable doing it at this age. So now I'm wondering if I should still enter him in the LCKC show and the Bandon show since those are only a few weeks off?

Kady Cannon said...

Yes, go ahead and enter. The extra teeth will not be there that long . . . one way or another.

Traci said...

and even if they are, it shouldn't be counted against him, should it???

CardiLover said...

Yeah, puppies are puppies and baby teeth that haven't come out shouldn't be counted against. We were only a couple weeks away from her first show when Savannah lost hers.

I think I'd find another vet if he thinks they have to go under GA to have teeth that are already trying to come out pulled. Do I hear dollar signs or just over caution? I think there is one in our office who would put them under to do toenails just so he could charge you. We avoid him like the plague, by the way. :)

Kate said...

Yeah, my instincts say "get a new vet," too.

Kady Cannon said...

Come to think of it . . . Kevin took Blue in back to pull that baby canine while I waited in the exam room. That was when she was 8 weeks so the roots hadn't dissolved at all. I'm sure that he just gave her a touch of gas and went "yank". It was probably 5 minutes and she was back to me.

Kevin is really good about putting them under just enough for what ever needs to be done. Generally c-sections in my experience :-(

Fox lady said...

Perhaps I misunderstood him, and it's true I've only been to him a few times, but he's super nice and good with the animals and in general this vet's office is one of the cheaper ones in town. Nonetheless I have just scheduled Ash with the more expensive vet that my other dog sees for a second opinion. I like the idea of just alittle gas and then yanking them out. Poor guy, although it doesn't seem to phase him, I suppose all the extra bones and goodies are helping!

I need orange said...

Sophie hung on to her baby teeth. The vet told me she'd pull 'em when S was spayed.

We had a 4-foot length of soft nylon rope (about half an inch in diameter). It was a good toy for the kid to use playing with the dog. The kid could run and the puppy would bite the rope rather than the kid.........

Anyway, we played some vigorous yank-back-and-forth-sideways tug, and those baby teeth came right out.

Did the same thing, sort of, with the kid, when one of her baby "eye teeth" didn't come out. Found the stickiest candy I could find, and told her to bite down as far as she could, and OPEN her mouth really fast. Came out on the second try......... :-)