It's A Mouthful

Being a farmer is a lot like being a detective. Since our animals don't speak our same language, some serious sleuthing has to take place when there is something wrong- and we have been doing some serious sleuthing for the past three months.

When Dimples arrived on our farm in March, I noticed she was incredibly skinny. Her bones were very prominent, she seemed to have diarrhea every other day, and one of her nostrils was always mucousy. In other words, not normal.

I began to investigate the options of diagnosis. She delivered a foal right at the onset of winter and nursed the foal through the cold months. Worms could also be causing the weight loss but she had had just been dewormed right before coming to our farm.

I separated Dimples with her foal from the rest of the herd in order to start her on a diet with some grain (the miracle weight creator for donkeys and not recommended except in certain circumstances) and allow her to get enough hay to eat. Dimples has a very calm personality and isn't one to fight for her food, like most of the other donkeys we have, are.

One day, I took Dimples out to eat some fresh grass (another miracle weight creator and one not recommended except in certain cases) and noticed she had some strange chewing patterns. It was then that I had the thought of possible tooth problems. When donkeys get older, usually in their teens, their teeth need to be floated or ground down. They develop really sharp points that can make it very painful to chew and can cause weight loss. Dimples is only eleven which is not very old in donkey years but I decided I would need a final diagnosis from the vet.

The vet did some blood work but the results were normal. Once she started looking in the mouth she finally found the problem - a tooth infection. You could smell it! It was the final missing puzzle piece that made everything make sense.

They gave Dimples a sedation shot to calm her down and then put a strange device on her head that pries her mouth open. Her teeth looked like sharks teeth with how sharp they had become and there were sores all over her gums.

The very back tooth was infected with pus that needed to be drained. Thankfully, the tooth didn't need to be extracted - yet. We got her teeth filed down, put her on a regimen of antibiotics, and are now waiting to see if the infected tooth will heal without needing extraction.

As of right now, she is eating well, her diarrhea has cleared up, and we are hoping to see some serious weight gain over the next few weeks. This was a bit more complicated of a diagnosis than I usually like to detect but so glad we got it figured out!