I’ve never had a male dog before, so forgive me if this is ignorant.
I let Sirius, my seven-month-old Jack Russell puppy outside. When I picked him up to bring him inside, I noticed a drop of white discharge around his penis. I wiped it away with a bit of toilet paper. It had a bit of a yellowish tinge, but he had just urinated. I have never seen this discharge before. There is no redness or swelling in his genital region, and he seems to be in perfect health.
He has been fixed-- I think it was in November that we had it done.
I have to take him to the vet today to get his nails clipped. Should I mention it, or is this something that’s normal to male dogs?
I asked my vet about it during one of my dog’s visits and he told me it’s smegma. Just gunk that develops because the dog can’t pull his foreskin back and wash his penis properly. Nothing to worry about.
This made me remember a James Herriott story where he told about a worried old man who came in with his dog, whispering that there was “summat wrong wi’ 'is ‘pencil’”. Herriott described pretty much the exact thing you did. He explained to the man that young dogs are full of “the joys” and it’s not unusual for a little leakage to occur. However, since your dog is fixed, it’s more than likely smegma. This thread just reminded me of that story.
Heck, I wasn’t even aware dogs had foreskins. I thought it was just fur. I can’t find any good sites on Google though – just pro- or anti-circumcision sites, nothing in between.
The same thing happened to my dog, and the vet gave him some antibiotics. But I wasn’t the one to bring him to the appointment, so I don’t know what the vet said. Anyhow, it was really minor and I bet it would have gone away by itself.
