Message Number: SG96 | New FHL Archives Search
From: sukiecrandall@telocity.com
Date: 2002-07-04 17:16:59 UTC
Subject: RE: Growth on foot
To: ferrethealth@smartgroups.com
Message-ID: <9092317.1025803019152.JavaMail.root@scandium>

Your vet should (and I expect is planning to) have pathology done on
the removed growth.

Missing a toe doesn't a made a difference, but there is one special
thing to remember (having been through this a few times): if at all
possible the vet should try to leave a lot of soft tissue over the
site. In our experience, ferrets are prone to tissue retraction
over time at areas where toes or parts of toes have been removed
whether by a novice mother, a deformity, or surgery, so it pays to
leave a good tissue pad there.

We even have one who has only two toes on one hand (a boywith a
deformity that let to two surgeries on that hand so that the radial
side is all he has in place in terms of digits -- thumb and first
finger), and he is as fast and capable as anyone else, except that
he has a scoop which makes him the fastest digger in all creation.

Watch it as time passes when you clip claws, since eventually tissue
might retract and further surgery be needed. It may always be fine
afterward, of course.