Preparing for spay

Good evening all.

My little girl Buggle is going to have her op on 28 November. She will be 5 months old. At her last vet appointment a few weeks ago she weighed 1.2kg (but I am sure the little greedy guts has piled some on since then).

I wanted your opinions on what I should do to prepare her for the op, and what I can expect afterwards. She is a lively little lady and always jumping around the place, up on the bed, tables etc. I know I will need to prevent her from doing this after the spay, but how?

She has a partner, Pancake, a neutered one year old buck. They are currently separated until I can rebond after she has been spayed. However they do still have supervised playtime every day. There were a couple of fights when the hormones first hit but now just the odd bit of humping (her humping him) but no aggression thankfully. Should I let them have some time together immediately after the op or not? Would it be better to keep her totally separate till she is back to her full strength. I'm worried one or both of them will be upset and miss each other. Even though the hormones caused some probs initially, they really do love eachother.

Hope that all makes sense. Your experience and opinions would be most appreciated

H

i would keep them seperate for a good few weeks (normally 6 weeks) as she is going to be sore and abit tetchy! maybe set up their pens next to each other so they can see but not get to each other

A heat pad, or hot water bottle is a must! Matilda just wanted to lie on a hot bottle for about 3 days after!

stock up on alot of dfferent types of veg as she will not be iterested in eating much so tempting her with everything and anything is a must!

I would also buy or get hold of some syringes (needless ofcourse) Matilda would only drink from a syringe for the first 3 days!

set up her pen like one giant litter tray! lots of newspaper on the bottle then nice comfy fleece on top, she properly won't use a litter tray as it will hurt her stomach to hop in and out

x

Ah, I have a syringe from their lapizole course, and recently bought them a heated snuggle pad! Poor little girl, it is so hard to imagine her with no appetite and immobile as her two favourite past times are eating and acrobatics!!

At the mo she is housed above Pancake. Hard to explain the set up but she can get up and down by herself. Obviously she won't be able to do that afterwards for a while. Would I be better off moving her into a dog crate so she can be a) on the floor and b) next to Pancake. Or would she be better off staying in her usual environment and me handling her to take her in and out?

In fact, is it advisable to handle her much after surgery? Seems this might make her more liable to injury if she were to put up a fuss?

Hi!:wave:
Are they housed outdoors?

If so...just be careful with the temps changes...make sure she is not in a hot area else she may over heat - saying this make sure she does have a warm place to go to if she wants - as her temp. will be down from the GA.

I housed my girls in an indoor set-up that did not enable them to jump up onto anything...their stitches need to heal properly so no jumping for a week or so.
They usally do dis-solvable stitches and then glue the skin...you can usually see it when they lay on their sides...as their fur is shaved...make sure there is no redness or swelling, or weeping

They prob will want to be quiet and left alone...an easy way to give them their meds is mixing it into a small bit of banana..mash it up - mine wolfed theirs down and waited for more.

I also used puppy pads as it was soft, kept the area dry and was easy to clean without disturbing them too much...and fleece. All laid over newspaper.

Def. use your snuggle safe and lay a fleece over it - so she has the option to have a warm snug space to lie..BUT make sure she also has a cool place to lay in case she doesnt want the heat.

I'd make sure she has a bowl of water...of course pop the bottle in too,but buns who are recovering or ill often wont lift their heads up to use a bottle..its harder for them than just drinking from a bowl.

Ensure you have her favorite fresh herbs, some apple twigs for chewing etc - anything she loves to entice her to eat. Make sure she has access to hay...try to keep it off the floor where she sits as yu dont want hay to infect her wound...dont be too worried, just keep an eye on it. I put loads of hay into a toilet roll.

She may smell different when she is bought back home after the op - so just be aware it may upset your other bun. Perhaps giver him a fleece and then her...so it has their smells on it and the leave it at the vets for her to have after her op as a comfort blanket with her usual smells on it.

I also packed a lunch for mine - their favorite dried hers..apple leaves, and some fresh herbs..rosemary, dandelion, rose petals and leaves and their usual nuggets. It really helped (the nurse said) and she was pleased they were keen on eating afterwards...the vets had a different type of food I gave mine - so I just specified mine be fed their lunchboxes...I wrote their names on them too.

You will need to check her wound...you can do this gently by telling them (for ages) what you are going to do and then gently lifting her front feet abit to peek underneath. In fact you could start trying this now so she gets used to it..or just lift her up fro a quick check and then straight down again.

hope this helps!

PS Mine were confined for a week and when the jumped right out the cage I had...well I figured they were ready for a little urn about -but left the jumps for a few more days. They do get bored..so toys and branches to chew on helps.

Some brilliant advice, thank you. They are indoor buns, have started doing some rejigging of their set up so they are both at the same level as each other. They now both have tons of room and I have none lol

Think I will also start getting her used to me checking her little tum

This has some useful info for me too as my girlies are in for their ops tomorrow.

Hi there,

to be honest, the hardest most worrying thing for me when my girl came back from her spay, was getting her to eat again. She was just lethargic and wanted to be left alone the first day, so i did. But then I got worried as she wouldnt eat anything! I got very worried and tempted her with all her favourite things until i found the magic item - radish leaves! And that was the only thing she ate for 1.5 days. So i would advise you to be prepared for a similar situation of not eating.

As for acrobatics, I tried to keep her away from her brother and her usual cage which required some jumping in and out. But to my surprise, on the second day, i opened her carrier and she took one huge leap into the cage with her brother! i wouldnt encourage acrobatics, but I do think they know when they are well enough...

And i would second the advice to keep her away from her male friend for a bit... maybe for the first few days or so. Let her heal up but let them see each other.

And finally, I want to assure you that all will be fine She will just need a little more attention than usual but if shes a healthy girl, she will heal up in no time