28/10/2026
Terrifying last few days here this week:
Started Monday morning with Widgeon, who started displaying very odd symptoms while waiting for the first drive at beating. Stretching oddly and repeatedly, bloated belly, drooling, rushed to the vets for suspected GDV (bloat).
By time we'd reached the vets, she'd become very wobbly on her legs, however vomiting in the consult room ruled out GDV, and with muscle tremors developing, diagnosis moved onto Mould Toxicity. With her being a typical Labrador, eating questionable things IS within in breed standard 🙄.
Left her in the vets for the for treatment, and she remained stable/improved steadily throughout the day, and i arrived to collect her for observation at home over night.
Just in time for her to take a steep downward turn, two hours later, shes finally stable enough for the drive to the overnight vets, where she recieved a treatment to bind to any toxins in the blood and ongoing sedation to manage the severe muscle tremors.
Collected her Tuesday lunchtime, wobbly, subdued, but well on the way to recovery and she was ecstatic to be home. As I arrived home, and settled her in the house so I could continue to monitor, I heard weird noises coming from the puppy pen.
Seal showing exactly the same symptoms as Widgeon had the day before. Muscle tremors/ataxia/drooling. Vet called, and rushed back in to the vets, decision was made to leave pups at home with all looking bright and happy.
Vets administered fluids, and same course of treatment as Widgeon and left her under observation in a dark kennel to keep her quiet. With two dogs now down with the same thing, we questioned whether the original diagnosis was still correct, with most collies being more discerning in their scavenging habits.
I came home to investigate round the lambing shed a bit further only to find two of the pups showing mild symptoms. And so entire litter loaded up and back to the vets we went.
Pups had slightly different treatment due to age and size, but 4 out of 5 all showed very mild signs. I recalled seeing both Wideon (Monday) and Seal (Tuesday) both sniffing round the same patch on the shed, and upon further investigation found spilled Dysect, thanks to the storm Sunday.
Vets confirmed that symptoms matched the reaction to the active ingredient, and that the treatment was the same as we had been doing. But that the poison centre advised that Seals milk could carry traces for 10 days, so puppies would need to be weaned.
Luckily they're on two solid feeds a day by now, so nutrionally shouldn't impact them too much, and i intend to see if Mable will be willing to dry-foster them for mental development.
Seal and all the pups came home at closing last night, and have all spent a quiet night with no further symptoms. So we seem to be successfully passed the worst, though I still have the stress of waiting for the bill 😅.
Big thank you to friends who stepped up to offer help/drive/sort dogs at home etc. And of course to Galedin vets for treatment.
