Baldric's Bolthole

Baldric has been very busy over the last week. He’s eating about ½c of biscuits every night and is continuing to try to build a nest inside the feeder box – I have placed other nest boxes in the fernery for him but he isn’t interested in these to date. Last night he did the reverse though and pulled the lining newspaper out of the box. Funny Boy. 

Keeping him confined in the garden wasn’t an acceptable long or even medium term situation however so after a few days of head scratching I came up with a solution to the conundrum of Baldric being trapped in the garden. I spoke with Donna and we agreed on the best place to make a bolt hole through which Baldric could access the outside world via Donna’s garden.

Ye Olde Bolthole ...

It didn’t take long for me to make it and I blocked it up with bricks until night had fallen - blocking it off prevents Westley going through during the day. That night I made a tunnel out of the bricks to stop mine and Donna’s cat hassling each other through the hole, I installed my IR camera about 1m from the hole and went inside to await the morning when hopefully I'd have some Baldric snaps to views.

Well, he found the tunnel all right and at 4.23am he went though it …. only  to come straight back into the garden at 4.25!   

I left it a few more nights before placing the camera again – which was last night. 

This time he left at 3.24am -

and returned at 4.51am 

 so he’s extended his excursion time but is still basing himself in the garden. He is looking really good and has obviously plumped up which he darn well should have with the amount of food he is eating! 

This is taken a few days later and is absolute proof he knows how to use his tunnel - he hasn't left though!

I’m going to try to get one of my wooden nest boxes sealed and into the garden this weekend to hopefully entice him into build a nest in which would make it much easier to monitor his whereabouts and condition, but he may well not ‘comply’ with my wishes, little brat.

Stealth Hog Revelaed!!!

Beautiful!

Tonight I was outside playing with Coco Cat at about 9.30pm when she suddenly stopped playing and sat at attention looking at the fernery - where the wild hoggie nest was located. AH HA thought I, maybe my visitor was up for the night! I raced inside and grabbed some gloves and my torch and went on a hog hunt. 

My suspicions were correct and it didn't take long  to locate the Stealth Hog who sat rather calmly observing me as I approached ...

Hmmm .... 

Scoping the hoggie up and bringing it inside I started to get a little excited as I thought I recognised the face and the hoggie was very squirmy and rather unconcerned at being handled.

At first I wondered if it might be Posh but on closer inspection it was revealed our visitor was a boy. Once inside under the lights I had a good look at the wee boy and he was in fabulous condition - albiet a little skinny due to just coming out of hibernation. There was absolutely no sign of mange or anything else untoward. 

Then, I made an amazing discovery ...

A bit skinny and 'pointy' but hey, he's only just woken up!

There in the middle of the hoggie's back was the faintest remains of some blue nail polish which means my little visitor is Baldric, come home to roost! I am so very excited and happy that he has successfully survived his first winter and that he is healthy and well. 

After reapplying Baldric's 'war paint' and giving him a dose of Advocate I took him back outside and popped him into the feeder box to have some dinner and to carry  on with the rest of his busy night. 

My beautiful little man Baldric

So, now ... well... 

I know I said that I wanted to capture the wildling in order to remove it from the back garden and let it go free, but I find I'm having some second thoughts about what to do. Baldric obviously knows where 'home' is and I don't have the heart to shut him out so what I'm going to do is cut a hole in the fence through to my neighbour Donna's garden so that Baldric et al can access the garden as he/they choose to. I'll make a lockable flap door for the hole so that during the day when Westley is out, the flap is closed and then open it up at night to give the wild hoggies access into the garden.

It's a feeder box Baldric, not a nest box!!!!

UPDATE: This was the feeder box this morning. Young Baldric has been a very busy boy overnight. I suspect he has gone to bed in the temporary bedroom box and will check later. BUT, I won't be moving the box out of the garden now. Instead, I'll get another wooden bedroom box made up and transfer him into that and this weekend I'll make a hog hole in the fence so he isn't trapped in my garden.

It will be really interesting to see if he leaves and for how long he stays away.

Crying for Crustina

Today is day 5.

Crustina has been in a steady decline since late on her 2nd day, losing 40+gms a day in addition to the weight lost from the mange crust and her quills. I have been syringe feeding her since day 3 and she was accepting the feeds and fluid ok until this morning. On day 3 - Monday, I sent a poo sample up to Narelle for analysis and yesterday she called to let me know that the slides showed a MASSIVE Coccidia and Capillaria burden as well as some Lungworm.

Then this morning little Crustina refused all attempts to feed her and by 3 pm it was obvious she had given up the fight, poor wee thing. With a heavy heart I took her straight in to the vet to be put to sleep.

Goodbye Crustina - May you be carried on your journey over the Rainbow Bridge on strong legs and with joy in your heart.

Stealth Hog

Telltale Poo!!

Hanging out the washing the other day I glanced down and what did I spot on the lawn but ....

Poo ....

At first I assumed one of the cats had diarrhoea - which was not welcome news in light of recent events, but on closer inspection and checking out the rest of the lawn I discovered that it was hoggie poo. LOTS of hoggie poo!

Now, this was a bit of a conundrum because the back garden is now fully 'enclosed' due to one side being shut off for Sonny's Garden and the other side being shut off to keep Westley on our property.

Hmmmmm ..... So .... Who? Where? What? How?

A tunnel fit for a hoggie

 Who?

Well, I suspect it could be be 'Red' as he had been sleeping in the garden bedroom box consistently for quite a while before he disappeared at the end of summer, and I assumed he had gone off to hibernate elsewhere.






Where?

Caught in the Act

There aren't many suitable hog nest sites in the garden and I knew no one had gone to sleep in the bedroom box - which I had subsequently removed once I had blocked off any remaining hog access via the remaining side gate. The most likely spot was my long term compost heap / dumping corner so over I trundled and had a good look. On the back side of the heap, near the fence I found a tunnel so the 'Where' was no longer a mystery.

What?

Already figured that one out - a Hoggie!

How?

Well obviously at the end of summer someone tunneled themselves a nice wee nest under the heap and has been fast asleep all winter. I confirmed this with my IR camera and caught the Stealth Hog in the garden the following night.

So now I need to figure out what to do. I'd quite like to have a look at the hoggie to make sure it is healthy, give it a dose of Advocate and to try and identify it before sending it on its way but I'm not going to disturb its nest. So I'll make a nice warm nest box out of a cardboard box (I haven't finished my wooden nest boxes yet, darn it) stuffed full of hay, in the hope the hoggie will move in to it. I'll give it a week and if it does move in I'll check it out then relocate the box to the front garden. If it doesn't take up my invitation I'll just leave the gate open with the camera on it so I know when the hoggie has left. In the mean time I've got a feeder box full of bikkies and and nice dish of fresh water which the Stealth Hog is enjoying every night.

Crusty or Crustina? It's Anyone's Guess ...

Crusty / Crustacia on admission

Every time I get a mangey hog in, I swear it is one of the worst I've seen. On reflection though, I guess I should say each one is the worst of that presentation that I've seen.

This is Crusty / Crustina - we can't tell the sex yet, as named by Geri, so we'll go with Crusty for now.

Worst Mange crack I've seen yet

Crusty was rescued in Te Aroha and brought to me at 7pm last night. His rescuers thought he had been attacked by a dog as he was bleeding but actually he had an uber thick mange crust which had split apart, taking his skin with it. The crack was about 2cm wide down his spine and 1cm wide across his shoulders. His feet were very red on their tops and I suspect the crust has been abrading them as he walks or he has been dragging to tops along the ground as he slowly became more frozen in place by the mange crust.






















He weighed 660gms was very, very stressed on arrival and other than checking him over as much as I could without traumatising him further and giving him a thorough oil treatment, I did little else other than give him some electrolytes, food and a warm bed to hide in.

This morning he was still with us and had eaten  and had more electrolytes during the night. I got him up and had another look at him and discovered his crust was lifting so had a go at removing some of it. I kid you not, it was literally like peeling a banana....It is the thickest, most extensive crust I've seen and man, does it smell!

After giving him some pain relief - which I couldn't do last night because he was dehydrated, I peeled off about 80% of his quills with attached crust. I'm amazed and relieved it has lifted so quickly. After that I managed to find a small patch of skin that wasn't bleeding and gave him his first Ivo jab and some oral Panacur. I treated the cracked and bleeding skin on his back and skirt with some special antiseptic spray and used some Colloidal Silver spray on his poor cracked and bleeding face.

This morning when I weighed him, Crusty weighed 696gms so he'd had a nice little gain over night was great. However, after seeing the huge pile of quills and crust I decided to re weigh him and was really shocked to discover he had lost 95gms! WOW!!!

Here he is when I'd finished. He could do with another oil treatment but I'll leave that until later today to let the spray treatments dry and for him to recover from everything I put him through this morning.

There is a lot more crust to come of yet and hopefully that will come away over the next few days. His face is massively crusted and cracked as well and that will probably take a week or two to resolve. However he did manage to open his eyes a little this morning. YAY!

Oh, Not Kero ...... Introducing Kera!

I've done it again!

 On Aug 8th I was giving Kero 'his' medication - this poor hoggie was mighty fed up with taking medication and I had had to figure out a way to get it into 'his' very tightly tucked in mouth without distressing 'him' too much.

The technique I figured out involved popping 'him' on his side and the tickling 'him' on his opposite side near the back leg. What this does is makes the hoggie squirm 'open'. First the back leg pops out, the the tummy followed by the head. It's actually rather sweet to watch.

On this day I was patiently tickling away and while I waited for 'him' to pop open a bit more I was admiring Kero's beautiful fat little tummy which was such a contrast to the appallingly emaciated wee creature 'he' has been.

Hang on ......

Kero ......

Where have your 'bits' gone?????

Yup, it transpires Kero is a Kera. She had been so incredibly emaciated and shrunken up that her she had looked like a boy (her genitals touched her nose when she curled up = boy) but as she had slowly gained weight, her 'bits' had gone south as her tummy had filled out and voila we have a girl!

Kera has now finished all of her medication except one more dose of Profender for her Fluke infestation. I had sent a 2nd poo sample to Narelle as we were still suspicious Kera had Fluke (a very nasty intestinal parasite) due to periodic 'snotty' mucous in her poo. This time the test confirmed she did indeed have Fluke, but treatment with the Profender will quickly knock it off.  Her quills are coming in fast and today she weighs 861gms. Her appetite is fantastic and she has a new light in her eyes. She's still very shy and is so very sweet.

She will probably be in care for about another 4 weeks whilst her quills finish growing in but I think it is safe to say that she is well out of danger and will soon be on her way back into the wild.

A Long Sonny Summer Coming Up!

Three weeks ago it became apparent Sonny was waking up from her hibernation. I could tell because there was a sudden increase in the amount of biscuits being eaten in her 'feeder' box - I KNOW RIGHT??? Yes, she is actually eating! She was also quite busy moving nesting material around and building new tunnels in/out of her nest.

So ........ it was time to get her up and weigh her.......

With some - aka massive, trepidation I gently removed Sonny from her nest. The change in her was immediately apparent - she felt a lot heavier, looked beautiful and when I took her inside and popped her on the scales I couldn't believe my eyes. She weighed an EPIC 860gm which meant she'd put on 152gms in just two weeks. I'm amazed you didn't hear my squeal of delight from your place because I was just over the moon happy and relieved.

Hi Mum!! How are ya?

The other big change was Sonny's demeanor. She was wriggly, nosey and seemed very content. There wasn't any sign of the growling, hissing, biting and depressed hoggie that I had put back outside in early winter. I gave her a dose of Advocate and popped her back into her nest, shutting the gates of her garden just in case she decided to have a wee tantrum and reject her nest because I had disturbed her - which she did indeed do, but not until that night.




The next morning when I checked in Sonny's feeder box I discovered that Madam had moved herself in and made herself at home. This was just fine with me! I didn't disturb her for a few days and once it was clear that she was going to stay put for a bit I removed the plywood cover from her old nest and installed it over the feeder/bed box to keep the sun and rain off it.

I opened the lid a bit so that the box didn't sweat and piled hay from th eold nest up against the front of the box to help keep the sun off it.







Then I put the ply cover over the top and left Sonny to it. So far she has stayed put even though I open the box every day to top up her food. She seems ok with this and says a quick hello before tucking her head back under her tummy and going back to sleep.

and then ...

Last night at about 10pm I went out to put the rubbish out and spotted Hector out in his run so I grabbed him and weighed him as he's going to be released in a few days so this was a good opportunity to weigh him without disturbing his daytime sleep.
I wondered if Sonny was up so crept over to her box and sure enough she was pottering along her 'hoggie highway'. I quietly scooped her up, weighed her and was delighted to discover that in the last six days she's gained another 52gms and was now 912gms. Her quills are shiny and she's round and plumb - just gorgeous!

Westley Wabbit Wonderful!

Home is where the hutch is.

 Well, what more can be said other than Westley is just a super, wonderful, awesome, amazing companion animal for Geri and simply a joy and delight to have as part of our family.

He now has a new house. It's much bigger, the bedroom is totally enclosed and is much more sheltered. I built a (carpeted!!!!) mezzanine platform in it for him and he loves to sit up on it. He is using the nest box (this is a chicken run) as his toilet - I've got a litter box with the pine pellet cat litter in there which makes cleaning a breeze. 

 To say this rabbit is spoiled rotten is the understatement of the year! He spends a very large portion of each day out of his house, galumphing, racing and binkying around the garden when he isn't grazing and sampling the delights of the orchard, the vege garden and other precious morsels!

In the evening he comes inside for cuddles and company. His usual routine is to either sleep on Geri's lap or her bed or  if he's feeling like he needs a bit more space he will hope a little way away and do one of his epic bunny flop overs. This is an indication of a rabbit that is sublimely happy and relaxed. It is a huge compliment for him to behave this way around us and shows he totally trusts us and feels very safe and secure.

Not comatose .... just fast asleep!

 Here come some more Westley pictures to make you smile and naaaaaaw!

Epic Bunny Flop Fail!

Soooooooo tired!

Hey! Can I Jump Down There?

Is This a Rabbit a Cat or a WHAT???

Kero the Hero

Day 1

WOW! Kero is teaching me a LOT! After an initial great weight gain he went into a serious decline with terrible diarrhoea and a complete loss of appetite. By Day 5 he was below his admission weight which was very bad indeed. I had spent the previous 3 days 'plonking' him in front of his food dishes every two hours in an effort to slow his weight loss as he was a very reluctant syringe feeder, so that was off the cards...

Day 9

In desperation on day 5, I made the decision to put him on some antibiotics in case the diarrhoea was being caused by Coccidia - a parasitic protozoan infection that can cause appetite loss/nausea, weight loss and green jelly like diarrhoea. As it was the weekend I decided I had nothing to lose because in my opinion if he kept losing at the rate he had been he would be dead within 24 hours.



The medication seemed to help and after 48 hours Kero rallied, his diarrhoea lessened and all of the nasty stuff associated with it - I don't really think you want the gory details, improved a lot as did his appetite. The next few days saw good, steady gains and I began to hope that he had turned a corner and that maybe the worst was over.

In the mean time Kero's mange had improved hugely, he was much less stinky and looked so much better - except that he was just skin stretched over bones. Poor little man.

Day 10

  On day 11 I decided to stop his antibiotics as he had had a 7 day course which is pretty standard for Coccidia and I was concerned that the medication may be causing the return of his diarrhoea which had once again hit with a vengeance. I also contacted the vet practice that had brought Hector to me, to find out how much some tests were going to cost as the time for guess work was over - we needed to try to find out exactly what was going on and I dropped a sample off later that day.

The loss trend continued on Day 12 with the amount lost jumping hugely so I decided to try giving Kero some probiotics whilst I awaited the lab results. Within 24 hours Kero had had a huge weight gain and his stools steadily improved as well which was a huge relief. He began eating like there was no tomorrow and started looking much happier and more comfortable in himself.


By Day 15 Kero looked like a completely different hoggie. His shape had rounded out quite a bit and his head wasn't looking too big for his body any more - well not quite so much anyway! The contrast with Day 10 was startling to say the least!

Day 15

 

 

 

Day 15

First thing on Day 15, I couriered a some poo samples up to Narelle so that she could run parasite tests for me. This was Kero's second sample to be tested - the first hadn't been too bad as it just showed Capillaria which his Ivomec injections and two courses of Panacur would have dealt with very efficiently.

Later that day I got a call with Kero's test results. It turns out that he is a very sick wee man indeed and it is amazing that he is still with us. His tests showed that he had both Gram +ve (bacilli & cocci) and Gram -ve (bacilli) bacterial infections as well as a yeast infection. To have both types of bacterial infection is very rare and it has been absolutely hammering his poor system - as evidenced by his symptoms to date. Turns out the probiotics were probably one of the best things I could have done for him. He's now been prescribed a new antibiotic which I'll collect tomorrow and I'll also grab a treatment from the pharmacy for his yeast infection.

Hopefully from here on it will be an unchallenged upwards curve of improvement for this little fighter. What a Champion he is!