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Life after head tilt

WalnutEarth626

Alpha Buck
My boy Topher suffered with head tilt a year ago, hes doing really well and can run around the garden etc and is perfectly happy. There are 2 things that would help make his life better. One of the few things he cannot do is drink from a water bottle, so he uses a bowl. However this does lead to him dribbling the water down his chin. This has lead to him losing the fur and the skin is a little bit scabby. The obvious solution is to stop him drinking from the bowl, I was wondering if it would be possible for him to get enough fluid from vegetables? And if so how much veg would I need to feed to keep him hydrated? And how do I then stop him scouring?

Secondly where his head is so twisted the eye weeps where all the wood shavings etc kick up in his face. Hes 6 years old so having the eye removed is not an option. What bedding could I switch too? What litter do you use?

Any advise is greatly appreciated.
 
My boy Topher suffered with head tilt a year ago, hes doing really well and can run around the garden etc and is perfectly happy. There are 2 things that would help make his life better. One of the few things he cannot do is drink from a water bottle, so he uses a bowl. However this does lead to him dribbling the water down his chin. This has lead to him losing the fur and the skin is a little bit scabby. The obvious solution is to stop him drinking from the bowl, I was wondering if it would be possible for him to get enough fluid from vegetables? And if so how much veg would I need to feed to keep him hydrated? And how do I then stop him scouring?

Secondly where his head is so twisted the eye weeps where all the wood shavings etc kick up in his face. Hes 6 years old so having the eye removed is not an option. What bedding could I switch too? What litter do you use?

Any advise is greatly appreciated.

Your poor boy, sounds like hes coping reasonably ok though :) Im afraid i cant give any advice on the water situation, although the amount of veg you would have to feed to keep him hydrated probably isnt good, but i could be wrong.

As far as the bedding/litter goes. Id swap to anything but shavings first, but have you thought about fleece/towels?

Sorry im not much help, but didnt want to read and run :wave: xx
 
Hi :wave:

I'm also mummy to a former head tilt bun. He doesn't have a tilt anymore but does have fur round his chin which is stretched and gets wet as well when he drinks. I don't actually do anything about it other than keep an eye on it. He cleans it up himself. I don't think they can get enough water from vegetables tbh. You'd still have to provide a bowl. However cucumber does have a lot of moisture in which might be enough to stop him needing drink quite so often. Could you ask your vet to possibly consider shaving the fur?
 
My cousin is a vet nurse and she actually shaved the fur a few weeks ago for me (it was all matted) and its made the situation worse! Before the water ran off the matted fur -now it goes straight onto his skin and has spead further round under his chin.

Shaving his read end really helped him though, he can keep himself clean but he cant stop the fur matting, so my cousin shaved it all off and he is much happier for it!
 
Oh dear :( poor thing. Not sure what else to suggest, it's something that I've puzzled over myself as well.
 
I used vet bed with towels underneath for my head tilt bun.

I'm not sure about the wet chin though...have dental problems definitely been ruled out? My head tilt boy needs regular dentals anyway, but his teeth needed doing more frequently when he was tilted...perhaps because he was only chewing on one side, or maybe because he didn't really eat hay whilst he was tilted?
 
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