Baby has a sore, growing each day

[dayna]

Found a second one on it's shoulder blade.

Feels kinda soft and smushy like maybe pus inside?

What do I need to do? Warm cloth? LA200 on the wound? LA200 injection? Sulmet oral? Nothing?

This was a baby that was in the nest attacked by rats. So likely it's rat bites festering.

 

[Comet007]

Poor baby! I have no idea really, since I am new to rabbits. I know for us and our dogs I use bentonite clay from here: http://www.redmondclay.com/products/

It is also an ingredient in the organic rabbit pellets we are looking at buying. I've used it on all kinds of insect bites and wounds and it is an amazing product. Last Summer I got a steam burn on most of my forearm (steam juicing mishap!) and had a 3rd degree burn on my arm with 6 or 7 big blisters that were each over an inch long. I got the clay on right away and all but two of the blisters were GONE! The two were my fault, I don't think I got the clay wet thoroughly. I've also used it on an infected spider bite and when I've cut myself.

I'm sure others who are knowledgeable about rabbits will be coming along with more answers for you!

 

[Dood]

I would moisten with water and pull off the scab, then clean out as much puss/**** as possible, using a q-tip and/or the end of a bobby pin if it is very thick, check it each day to be sure it doesnt scab over again and let it heal from the inside out

 

[michaels4gardens]

after you do what "Dood " said, -- If it does not start to shrink and heal in a day or three, -- I would add some barberry root bark [cut/sifted [not powder] to the feed as an antibiotic [that does not kill gut flora] -- {that is just what I do] --//or// add injectable antibiotics to the program

 

[MamaSheepdog]

Poor bunny! Dang rats! :angry:

I would clean it out as suggested. Hydrogen peroxide will help loosen the pus, but I would worry about it getting in the eye- you can at least irrigate the shoulder wound with it though.

When TenSpot had the infected Bot-fly tract, I squirted raw organic honey into the wound after cleaning it out. Raw honey is antibacterial, but I am not sure if the pasteurized type is still effective. They market one called Manuka honey, but my personal belief is that there is no real difference aside from clever marketing.

The bentonite clay sounds interesting! We have an area on the dirt road that is bentonite- I'm tempted to collect some and try it. Comet, have you used it on abscesses? Did you leave it in there once dry, or did you rinse and repeat the application later?

I haven't tried using antibiotics in wounds, but if you want to do so, I would recommend a droplet of Pen-G procaine.

*I am moving this to our new section Illnesses, Injuries, and Parasites in the Rabbit Care Forum.

 

[michaels4gardens]

Do you bake the bentonite to kill bacteria [etc,] before using it? [I do-- if I have collected it from the hillside]--

I haven't tried using antibiotics in wounds, but if you want to do so, I would recommend a droplet of Pen-G procaine

I tried using injectable antibiotics [combiotic] in a wound once, and it "seemed" to me that it made it more inflamed-- if it works for someone I would like to know--

 

[MamaSheepdog]

Do you bake the bentonite to kill bacteria [etc,] before using it? [I do-- if I have collected it from the hillside]--

That was my plan! What temp do you bake yours at? Is 450F high enough? I was planning on rinsing it first as well.

 

[michaels4gardens]

I am sure 450 is high enough, I just spread it out in a cookie pan and bake at 400 for about a half hour- I am sure more would not hurt--- I don't rinse mine, I just dig it from a spot without roots and junk in it.

 

[BlueMoods]

I'd get the scabs off, as suggested, then flush with saline to get as much puss out as I could, then put a petroleum based ointment on to prevent further infection and, kee form getting hard scabs. Flush as needed with saline (eye was would do fine for that)

I bake bentonite at 400 for one hour, a bit overkill since getting it to 185 will kill anything in it, but better safe than sorry.

 

[TwoAcreDream]

How about using a soft vitamin E capsule. Take a needle and pop
a hole in one end and squeeze the contents onto the sore. That
should soften the scab up and not be irrating. Especially close to
the eye like that.

The one cali I have, one of the 2 in my avator, had bad sores by her ears
/ top of forehead. The gal I bought her from said she fell out of the cage and
her cat clawed her up bad. They put bag balm on the sores. After I bought
her , I did not do anything for the sores. Just made sure they stayed dry
and it all healed nicely. I cannot be 100 % sure now which doe is which.
I am pretty sure it is the bigger one of the 2 and she just kindled this
morning, with her first litter

 

[Comet007]

The bentonite clay sounds interesting! We have an area on the dirt road that is bentonite- I'm tempted to collect some and try it. Comet, have you used it on abscesses? Did you leave it in there once dry, or did you rinse and repeat the application later?

You use the clay differently depending on what you are treating. For a burn you put it on, wait until it just starts drying at the edge, rinse & repeat until the burn is gone. I've had smallish burns that blistered and after 3-5 rounds with the clay you can't even tell that I got burned. This is in the course of maybe an hour, I think. For an insect bite you put it on and let it dry, as it dries it will draw out the poisons. Their website has more info, you can use it differently depending on what you're treating.

Not sure if this is what you mean by abcesses, but - last year I had an abscessed tooth, the dentist said the whole root was infected and he wanted to pull the tooth. They also said I needed gum flap surgery on my whole mouth. I started using the bentonite toothpaste sold by Redmond clay, and three months later when I went back to start getting the work done the infection was gone! The dentists were both completely flummoxed. I didn't need to have the tooth pulled OR have surgery!

The burn I spoke of in my previous post, I did it wrong! I was in the process of making juice in my steam juicer when I got the burn. I was home alone late in the evening and still needed to finish processing the juice, plus canning it, then running the fruit mash through the strainer, spread on trays for fruit leather and get it all in the dehydrator. So, instead of treating the burn properly I put a bunch of clay on (the burn actually wrapped all the way around my forearm, except about two inches on the top that didn't get hit. It went from just above the wrist almost up to the elbow) I just put the clay on, then wrapped my arm with wet paper towels, then saran wrap, then an ace bandage and went back to work. When I was done with the fruit I was tired, so I just went to bed without changing the clay out. :roll: :roll: My bad. All that was left of the burn when I got the clay off the next morning is what's shown in the picture below. A second blister did pop up (about 2" long x 1" wide) in that lower red area. Turns out that I had given myself a 3rd degree burn! I still think that if I had changed the clay out 2 or 3 times that night I would have gotten rid of all the burn evidence. This was last May, and there's still a faint outline on my arm from this. Whenever I go to cook something DH says, don't burn yourself, don't cut yourself. I say…. whatever! LOL.

 

[michaels4gardens]

I like using clay or comfrey poultice on Brown Recluse bites also-- it will sure remove all the rotten spot quick.
--I once burned myself with a cutting torch [long story] but after I got the fire out by sticking it down into the mud, I washed it off, and soaked in the river for a while and re-packed it with mud, and was taken to the hospital, "the doc" said i would need skin grafts and the mud pack would just cause a lot more problems and infection, so he wraped it in a clean bandage and said I had to meet with the surgeon, and him in the am to see how much was alive under all the chared meat-- I went home and repacked it in mud, till night and then coated it with cut-heal and went to bed-- the next day at the "doc" they made a lot of noise about me killing myself with some stinky stuff in my wound, -- but when the wound was examined little bits of skin were starting to grow from the hair folicles, -it looked like little flowers in the magnifying glass, -- any way the plastic surgeon, and doc canceled the skin grafting -and told me to keep doing what ever it was I was doing---and it healed up just fine with my program-- the doc. said he had never seen anything like it.

 

[Comet007]

That is some good stuff! I think doctors today have forgotten the roots of traditional medicine. There's a lot that can be done with just natural ingredients! Not to say modern medicine is all bad, just that it's not always the best or only answer!

Dayna - I do hope that you can get that bun healed quickly! Good luck.

 

[dayna]

Weird, I keep finding more and more sores... even on the gentials.

Any thoughts now? Kinda weird.

 

[MamaSheepdog]

Weird, I keep finding more and more sores... even on the gentials.

Eww. Poor kit. I guess a rat could have bitten it all over the place, but... eww.

That wound by its eye looks really strange to me. The proud flesh and the weird colored "scab" just seem so different than a normal injury. How do the other wounds look?

Did you clean it (them) out, and if so, what kind of stuff was in it?

 

[michaels4gardens]

might be time for a antibiotic, could be a systemic infection

 

[Comet007]

I'm sure you've already asked Dr. Google, but a quick search suggested that it could be a number of things - fungal infection, bacterial infection, mites or other things. I don't know what these things look like on a rabbit. I hope you can figure out what's wrong with it.

 

[dayna]

Ugh I feel a little sick to my stomach. It's GROSS. And the stuff inside is hard. I can't even pick it out... I'm not sure what to do other than cull.



-- Sun Feb 16, 2014 2:45 pm --

Oh and I had a goat once with a staph infection abscess and it smelled a lot like this... <br /><br /> -- Sun Feb 16, 2014 3:07 pm -- <br /><br /> I put it down. I counted 10+ sores, filled with pus on it's body. I didn't open it up to see if it had internal abscesses. I sealed it up in a zip lock. My husband was worried that I was exposing myself to a staph infection and here that's a real serious issue as things don't heal quite as well and icky yuckies grow really well.

 

[MamaSheepdog]

Let me say it again... eww.

I wonder if the pus caked and got hard because the wound was so open?

Regardless, I think you made the right decision to cull. I'm sorry you had to do that- I hate culling young rabbits due to illness. It is a hard thing to do, even knowing it is the right course. ((Hugs))

Are the other kits okay?

 

[BlueMoods]

Bentonite is good stuff for bites, burns, even can be used a styptic powder if you clip a nail too short or for cuts. Apply dry and just let it dust off the wound naturally (or the rabbit clean it off). We use it on human and animal alike, even for toothpaste for us and the wolfdog (when he needs it) I make my own. I mix 1 TBS dry, baked bentonite with 1/2 TSP powdered, dry mint leaves then when I want to use it I add 1/4 TSP vegetable (sunflower or safflower is fine too) oil and enough lukewarm water to make a paste then, dip a toothbrush and brush away.

There is some grey proud flesh but, that may be just bluish pigmentation in the rabbit's skin making the scab look that color. If new sores are still appearing, I'd be asking a vet. Rats can carry a lot of diseases, some that cause sores.