The American Beagler Forum

OK here's my question/ problem! Ive had this going through my kennel for about 4 months. First time it was a young pup 5 months old, the swelling started on the right side of her head behind the eye, it moved to the left side of her head then down the bridge of her nose before I took her to my vet. The vet said this was one she hadn't seen before; treated the dog with anti-biotics and she recovered.
Two months later two more of my dogs developed the same symtoms, again another trip to the vet same treatment and the symtoms left.
Amonthe later another dog gets the same thing but this time on the neck in the adams apple location. It was fully erupted when I discovered it so I lanced it myself. I drained about 10 cc's of bloody puss out. I gave him a shot of procaine and started him on cephlexin. He was cleared up in 3 days. Ive had my dogs to two different vets and they both have run lab tests to determine what they have. One test came back that it is a bovine respitory infection. The other said it shows as a staph infection. My problem is not how to treat it? Ican clear it up . I would like to know what it is so I don't have to deal with it every 3 weeks.By the way the dogs are kenneled individully on limestone, are wormed regularly and seem to be very healthy even when they have the swelling! One female has had it three times two male and another female have had it twice, so far 12 of my 13 dogs have had this .All help will be appreciated! thanks

I had something similar, the first dog was a pup and had a big lump come up under his neck, it swole up really big, I took him to the vet and they said it was " puppy strangles" they put him on a steroid and an antibiotic and it went away in a few days, just two weeks ago one of my older dogs had the same symptoms, I put him on steroids and an antibiotic and it began to weep a mixture of blood and puss, just really nasty looking. The kicker is that the swelling was so big that the skin burst and left a 3 inch hole in his skin under his neck area, I took him to the vet and had him stitched up, they said it was an abcess but I don't know if they truly know what it was, anyway it cost me $300 bucks, to get him sewn back up and checked out. He seems to be doing fine now, and he will get his stitches out on this coming friday.

Big Dog

i had this happen to me a few years back.took the dog to the vets and they found hair like fibers in the puss that they drained.he said it looked like fibers from hay and asked me if i was using hay as bedding.i told him yes.he said the dog was eating the hay and the fibers were acting like quills and were working into the dogs throat and created an abcess under the lower jaw and neck.needless to say i dont use hay as bedding anymore.i use ceder chips and have not had any trouble since.