Well it finally happened. (long story involving a porcupine follows...)

Last night after a long day at work I took Oscar, who had been with me all day, for a nice walk through the woods before the sun went down. I work in a very rural area and the woods are all around. Oscar is free to run and chase squirrels and just generally get some beans out.

At some point along the trail Oscar picked up the scent of something and started following it, this usually ends at the base of a tree or under a rock or something, but THIS time he abruptly stopped short at some point and alerted to a critter. I was hoping for maybe a wood turtle or a toad, but NOOOO, Oscar found a porcupine! I couldn't even see what it was because he was 20 feet or so off the trail, but after a little investigation, he dove in for a bite. When his face came up with a mouthful of quills it was suddenly obvious and I got nervous. For sure he would back off after his nose turned into a pincushion... wait, that would require SENSIBLE LOGIC! And sadly, Oscar is a bit short on that. INSTEAD, he dove in for another bite! And another! And another! BRILLIANT!

At this point I'm wading through the brambles in my shorts to fetch him, as my attempts at calling him off seemed to be futile. I was actually in flip flops (I'll never go into the woods without sneakers again!) and lost them both gaining control over him - boy was he MAD!! If I ever had doubts about him (a goofy Rhodesian Ridgeback) being capable of killing the rodents he chases all the time, I don't anymore. He wouldn't quit!!

After finally hauling him off and letting the porcupine waddle away, SLOOOOWLY - and it was a BABY porkie by the way, not only do I have a DUMB dog, but I have a big BULLY as well! I was able to drag him onto the trail to assess the damage. Could have been a lot worse - since the critter was young, none of the quills were over an inch and a quarter, and they were all pretty soft and not embedded very deep. BUT he had most of them IN his mouth. Genius that he is, he just kept trying to bite the sorry thing and since it was small (and his mouth is big) most of the quills ended up in his lips, gums, on the roof of his mouth and under his tongue. Eeeek!

Again, could have been worse, I'm guessing he had roughly 75-100 quills in total. I carefully pulled out the ones on his muzzle and lips right there on the trail. He kept trying to ram his head into the ground and paw at his face, so I wanted to get them out asap (we had a little walk to get back to the office). Once in the office, I found tweezers and just backed him into a corner, straddled and bear hugged him, and started to pull them all out. It wasn't pleasant and he wiggled and winced, but ultimately let me help, even let me pry his mouth open and thoroughly remove what was in his gums (those actually came out the easiest). An hour later I was done, we washed his face completely and let him have a drink of water.

Continued to check him over all night, every time I had a minute I would really feel his muzzle, run my fingers over his gums and check his paws. He ate dinner no problem, and woke up perky this morning as usual - spinning around in circles trying to get us out of bed to start the day. No redness, bleeding, swelling or other obvious irritation.

I didn't want to take him to the vet last night because A. It was after hours and we'd have to drive over an hour to the emergency vet, B. that would be very expensive, and C. They would have had to knock him out to get in his mouth and I really don't like putting him under if I can avoid it, which we did. He seems completely fine and we'll keep watching him, but I'm wondering if what I did was OK. Most reading I have done says you can pull quills out at home UNLESS they're IN the mouth, then you should see a vet... maybe that's just because most dogs won't let you reach in there and do what I did...? Should I be worried that I missed a broken off barb and that it will migrate into his organs or something?? I read about that too... but even a vet wouldn't be able to find something like that till it caused a real problem.

My poor boy. I felt so bad for him last night - right after I wanted to KILL him for being so stupid!

Sorry for the uber post,
~Natalya

I'm sorry to hear this.

My advice is instead of calling your dog a "big bully", Realize you have a dog with tons of prey drive. The drive most owner would kill for.

Now the key is to harness that drive, and control it so that a simple command could have prevented a mouth full of needles.

much luck, take care.

Guess you're both lucky it wasn't a poisonous SNAKE <:-O IMHO, you should perfect his recall while in drive before allowing him to run around offlead again, especially in the wooods (afterall, RR's are hunting hounds!)...

Wow Natalya. I'm glad Oscar is ok. I don't have much experience with that sort of stuff, but keep an eye on him for the next day or so. If you think you got all the quills, he should be ok. That's one of the reasons I don't trust my dog off leash. Where we walk there are beavers and tons of prarie dogs...my dog goes nuts when she sees them.

My granddog (working earth dog) had a run-in like this. He had to be dragged out of the downed hollow tree by the tail, I believe three times. He had a faceful.

http://www.howstuffworks.com/home-remedies-for-dogs-ga6.htm

The vet took a few hours removing the quills.... and yes, it cost a LOT.

I think you are doing the right thing with your continuing vigilance; as you are obviously aware, infection from particles still embedded is the main worry.

If you saw that, of course, or even inflammation that was new, you'd take the dog to the vet.

Your story really took me back. Scary how angry my Border Terrier granddog got.... zero concern for their personal well-being, those guys.

Be thankful it was not a run-in with a Badger. Two days ago I helped a pet owner take her large mix into the vet after tangling with one. Not a pretty sight and over 250 stitches. He had lost alot of blood, so he is staying at the clinic for three or for days so that they can do what they need to for him.

She was out walking with him and the badger came out of his hole that they were too close to and went after the dog.
Thank goodness it did not go after her......

I would much rather pull quills than that.

 Quote: Candi Campbell

Guess you're both lucky it wasn't a poisonous SNAKE <:-O IMHO, you should perfect his recall while in drive before allowing him to run around offlead again, especially in the wooods (afterall, RR's are hunting hounds!)...

Seriously - that posibility wasn't lost on me

Luckily we don't have many, if any, poisonous critters here in northern VT, but a bigger and more able porcupine could certainly have done real damage.

And I agree about the recall work - looks like it's getting seriously important now that he's a grown up with his own ideas. I haven't heard good things about RRs being trainable to recall while in full prey drive, they're pretty nutty and VERY independant, but we can certainly work a lot harder on it. I would say this is his toughest training challenge, I've never seen a dog go so loony over the chase.

It was an unfortunate experience, but the good thing is that your dog is okay. On weekends, I take my dog for long walks out in the boonies. There are squirrels, tons of jackrabbits, skunks, wild boar, coyotes, and the list goes on. We only walk in daylight, so we've only bumped into squirrels and jackrabbits. Walking late in the evening can be a bit dangerous.

He is allowed to be off-leash, BUT with an e-collar on. My dog also has tons of prey drive, and will chase a ball as if his life depends on it, lol. As Candi said, some solid recall work will avoid future accidents.

Ed uses this training drill that will work nicely for your situation, and for high prey driven dogs. He talks about it in one of his articles, but I can't recall which one. You can see it in action in his Basic Obedience DVD, in the chapter that covers toys...that's if you have the DVD.

It's not a recall, but it's more like giving your dog the "down" command while in drive. This particular drill came in handy when we were surprised by a stray dog while heading out to the boonies, and also when we encounter jackrabbits.

This is how it works: You throw a ball, and allow the dog to chase it. Before he gets to the ball (about half-way through) give him the "down" command. If he ignores you, correct him. Most likely, he will probably ignore you the first few times. An e-collar is the perfect tool for this type of training, but a long line can also work...you'll just have to chase it as your dog runs. If he does lay down, praise him and allow him to go get the ball by saying whatever word you use in obedience/marker training.

You can include the drill during a game of ball-retrieving. Like obedience training, keep it short.

It's important for your dog to already have a solid OR reasonable "down" under various conditions/distractions before you attempt this drill. If not, it will be unfair for your dog, as you may already be aware of. If I find the article, I'll post it up.

 Quote: tedefthymiadis

I'm sorry to hear this.

My advice is instead of calling your dog a "big bully", Realize you have a dog with tons of prey drive. The drive most owner would kill for.

Now the key is to harness that drive, and control it so that a simple command could have prevented a mouth full of needles.

much luck, take care.

I too am sorry to hear your story. But I am with tedefthymiadis on this...the drive your dog has sounds to be awesome.

You did post to inquire about the needles, and I agree with what you are doing, IMO, the liklihood of a barb traveling to an organ is slim, though I am not a vet, nor have I studied up on porcupine quills...

I'm glad to see in your second post you managed to squeak a LITTLE accountability for this having happened to your dog. Good luck in training.

Poor Oscar...sounds like you both handled it well though. Porcupines....the scourge of Vermont. Oscar sounds like he has incredible drive. Yay that all of the quills were easy-out; the big ones can be really difficult and require the dog to be under anesthesia....sad that I know that . The skunks aren't much fun either . It's pretty common here in VT to let dogs off-lead in the woods because of the lack of deadly creatures that we have here, and the myriad of squirrel-chasing opportunities. Maybe we can use it to our advantage training-wise? I sent you a PM Natalya