So Puppy-Head McBrownPants has been worrying at his butt lately, so I called the vet - it’s time for his check up and shots, so I booked him in and mentioned the butt deal to the receptionist.
“He needs his anal gland expressed.” came the receptionist’s cheerful reply.
Can you say EW, with a capital “E”?
Apparently this is something that is generally done when dogs go to the groomer, however, I groom Voltaire myself, and I prefer to avoid his butt region as much as possible.
Fortunately, the vet’s office is quite happy to do the expressing for me, so I can continue to avoid the issue.
What I really want to know, however, is what the hell do wolves do? Do they express each other’s anal glands for one another? Serious grass scootching? Some sort of tree bark rubbing?
IANAV, but I understand that the need to express the anal glands can be affected by a dog’s diet. Normally, if the dog’s stool is firm enough, the glands are kept clean through the pressure of a regular bowel movement. If the stool is too soft, the glands will fill and require expressing. I’m sure there are plenty of other factors, but this is what I have been told.
They will probably spray your dog’s butt with freshener after the fact because, as you can probably imagine, the expressing process produces a rather foul odor.
To be totally honest, I wasn’t really interested in ALL of the nitty gritty details. My very vague understanding is that it involves some sort of squeezing in the butt region.
As if I could do that to my dog. He’d never be able to look me in the eye again! It would be almost as bad as when I had to inspect Benny-the-Bunny’s hoo-hawectomy incision - embarrasing for both of us.
(Ya know, a thread like this really needs a barfing smilie).
Ok no! Voltaire is one of those weird dogs that isn’t much of an eater - I’ve finally found a food that he likes well enough to actually consume, but it does make his turds sort of soft.
James Herriot tells of one of his patients (Tricky Poo, a Pekingese owned by a very rich eccentric woman) that needed this kind of treatment, and it was caused by the dog’s diet. He tells funny, funny stories, and some very sad ones too, his books are an interesting look at humankind.
I don’t think it means you’re a bad pet owner at all. It all comes down to comfort levels. I did a stint as a volunteer in an animal shelter, so I had to get over squeamishness and “I won’t do that” haughtiness. Some of the things I learned hurt the animals, even if it was in their own best interests, and I’m sorry I had to do them.
Shoot, pay someone else to get sprayed with ass-juice!
Mine had two that got REAL big. I got a quote in the high three figures for surgery and said, “Love ya, dog, but not THAT much.” Well, he scootched and popped on on his own (downside: it was on the living room carpet. upside: Wife cleaned it up before I got home.) He still had the other when Wife brought home a curious and sharp-toothed puppy, henceforth known as Dr Dog. Fixed him right up!
My parents had toy poodles, and their ass glands had to be squeezed regularly. Dad did the grooming, and ass gland detail. It wasn’t all that bad, he just squeezed their butthole and zit-like puss came out.
I never knew all dogs needed it, I figured it was a poodle only thing. My Rat Terrier doesn’t need to have his butthole squeezed, but he eats dry dog food almost exclusively and has firm dog turds.
FWIW.
Oh, and they had an old tom cat. He got into a fight and got an abcess on the base of his tail. I got talked into taking him to the vet since me and that cat had a bond thing going on.
Anyway, the abcess popped in my car before we got to the vet, so I got stinking, bloody cat puss all over the damn place, and the vet shaved the sore when we got there, and I got to hold the business end of a large tom cat while he did it.
Or have the glands surgically removed. Same process as is done in ferrets when they are “descented” prior to selling them. In my part of the world, I charge around $100 to spay a 25 pound dog, and around $300 to remove the same dog’s anal glands (just to put things in perspective).
BTW, Metamucil is a good source of fiber, as is canned pumpkin. Both are dosed by body weight and are gradually introduced over a coupla weeks time.
I’m really reluctant to get my dog any sort of surgery that he doesn’t absolutely need, so these options may be worth further investigation - I’ll discuss it with his vet.
I would just switch his food, but he’s REALLY picky - at his last check up both the tech and the vet half accused me of STARVING him because he was so small - I wasn’t - he has food down at all times, he’s just not a big eater. So I finally found a food that he’ll actually eat and he’s at a more normal weight, and now his bung-hole is pluged.
BAH! It’s a good thing he has a lot of dog charisma or there’s no way I’d put up with this…
Just watch the vet squeeze the glands. It’s really not that big of a deal. No more than changing a loaded diaper on my ooog-o-meter (yeah, I realize this is a pet and not a child, but changing a couple dozen diapers a day just can’t compare with squeezing a dogs butthole every month IMHO).
