A Spring In Her Step

Portuguese Water Dogs are hairy creatures. They have hair growing everywhere including their ear canals and other  unmentionable places. In case you're wondering, the hair in the ear canals protects the eardrum from cold water while swimming. I don't know what purpose the hair in the unmentionable places serves. They also grow lots of hair on the bottom of their feet.

Sky was forever getting little stones wedged between his foot pads and the stones would get twisted in his long hair and form hard painful mats. He would let me know he had these mats by constant foot licking and I'd cut the mats and stones out for him.

Morgan is not a Portuguese Water Dog, but she also has hairy feet. Rob and I both noticed that she was limping and we thought it was from her knee injuries and didn't pay too much attention. Then Thursday night she started licking her front foot and chewing on the pads.

We put her up on the bed and I examined her foot. There was a mat between her pads so I grabbed my embroidery scissors because they're very small and I thought I could get in the tight little area to cut out the mat. Rob held her while I attempted the surgery, but she struggled and twisted and tried to pull her foot away. I was able to cut away part of the mat but afraid of cutting her if I tried to get the rest.

Friday morning I called the clinic and spoke with one of our techs. I explained the situation and asked if she would try to remove the mat. I had checked the other front foot and there was a smaller mat in that one, too. She agreed to try and we both thought that Morgan might hold still for her.

Rob and I drove over with Morgan and he took her into the exam room. I waited in the lobby. I didn't hear any howling or yelling so I assumed it was going well. About ten minutes later they all came out and our tech said it was a good thing we'd brought her in because she had mats in all four feet and there was an especially large one in one of the back feet. She was able to cut them out and shave down to the skin with a number 40 blade.

Morgan walked out of the clinic after her mani pedi without a limp. Then she went home and ran the length of the yard with the other girls.

 She's feeling much better and we'll be checking all the hairy feet on a regular rotation to make sure nobody is trying to walk on painful mats. It's no fun to have a stone in your shoe, imagine having one attached to the bottom of your foot.