Hiking and Surgery

My vacation went well, spent Saturday, Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday morning hiking in Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore. We had great weather for it, and only got rained on one night. The first and last nights, it actually was pretty chilly. I was warm enough in my 40 degree bag, so it didn't get too cold, but I did end up cinching it around my head.

I had Keira stay with my parents for the last week and a half, and then I went and picked her up after we got done with our hike. When I had picked her up at the beginning of June from being boreded, I had noticed that she had a bit of a limp, but didn't seem to be sore as I felt her leg, but she seemed to get better after a few days, and wasn't limping noticeably any more. I thought she must have done something to it in the kennel. It turns out that wasn't the case.

Mom and Dad would take her and our other dog on a walk every morning, and by the end of it she was limping along, and then when dad touched her hip, she yelped, and ran away from him. Normally she loves him, and will run and jump up in his lap when he's sitting on the couch, so this was kind of strange for her. Mom made a vet appointment to have her looked the day we were starting to hike. The vet looked at her, and checked the movement on her leg, and Keira wasn't to happy about that, so the vet recommened we get her X-rayed. Since they don't do x-rays at the vet in Bluffton, we had to make an appointment to have her done at the Ottawa clinic. I was done hiking the day before her appointment, so I was able to go when we took her to get checked. It turns out she either has necrosis of the head of the femur (it had some name that started with A which I can't remember), or it could be hip displasia, which is something miniature austrailian shepherds can be prone to. Basically, on the ball and socket joint of her left hip she is missing the ball part.

Now I get to have a Femoral Head and Neck Osectomy done on her, which is where they will go in, and cut off the part where the ball should be, but which looks more like a thumb bone. This will remove all the bone to bone contact which is probably painful for her, and then scar tissue will form a false joint. It works best on dogs under 35-45 pounds, since there is less weight that needs to be supported on them. She's too small to have a total hip replacement, so that's one good thing, but it will still cost me about $500 for the surgery. Hopefully we can get it scheduled for the beginning of August. She'll be staying with my parents for a few weeks while she has it done, since they're not back in school yet and have time to look after here the few days after she has it done.