Donkey Damage

Within a 3-week period, I made 5 trips to the vet to repair my donkey damages.  First, I noticed a tail was severed, so I treated it and thought everything would be okay -- wondering what it the world could have done it.  About a week later, another one had a chunk of flesh missing, so I treated that and hoped for the best.  I finally figured out that Mary M was in heat and while she could be so loving at times, she would lose it and go after the little kids.  Guess these two were a little slower than the others.  Hormones . . . who knew.

Well, the kid with the chopped off tail ended up getting and infection, high fever (picture me on the kitchen floor with it in a pan splashing cool water on it so it wouldn't have a seizure), and rounds of three different antibiotics.  I was also taking its temp every morning and afternoon and giving it shots of a drug to lower its fever.  Right before trying the third antibiotic, the vet and I thought it was futile because the infection was traveling up the spinal cord to the brain and one of his back legs had become very weak.  Happy ending -- vet gave me what he said was his last suggested antibiotic and, after my giving him three shots of this over the course of several days, he started recovering and is now just fine -- except for his very short tail.

Still treating the other one and you can tell how much it has grown over the past few weeks.  When I got back from vacation, the wound had become infected -- more trips to the vet, more antibiotics, more medical procedures.  I have one more day to flush out the wound (after becoming infected for the second time) and the vet thinks this should do it.  Travis, the young man next door, comes over to hold the goat. First time I tried the procedure, I ended up squirting the iodine solution on Travis when the goat jerked.  (It can be a real zoo around here.)