I hate to admit it, but I quicked Daisy while I was grooming her late Thursday night. I was surprised when she yelped because I thought I was being careful. She didn't seem too upset and I didn't have any styptic powder so I packed flour on it for a few minutes. I looked at it and it seemed to have stopped bleeding and she was walking normally. I put her in the crate for the night and went to bed.

About 3 o clock this morning (Friday) she wanted to go out, which was unusual, but I put her outside and let her spend the rest of the night out there since it was nice. She seemed fine this morning. I went out in the early afternoon for a few hours and when I got back around 5 I, thought it looked like she was favoring that foot, but really wondered if I was just imagining it. She was putting all of her weight on it and the injured claw was a dewclaw, so I didn't think it would affect her walking that much. I was home for an hour or so and went to pick up my husband from work. By the time we got back she was limping noticeably.

I looked at her paw to see if she had stepped on anything , but didn't see anything new (though her feet are er, furry so its hard to tell for sure). The cut nail didn't look too bad either. She acted like her whole foot was painful, though. I soaked her foot in hydrogen peroxide and tried to spray on some stuff for pain relief (no idea if it worked). Now she's hardly putting any weight on it at all and acting like just having it touch the floor while she's lying down is painful.

I've cut dogs before, but never had anything like this happen. Does any one have experience with this sort of thing? Is infection plausible this soon? Should I take her to the vet? Her appetite is completely normal, her attitude is only slightly subdued, but she's obviously in pain. I'm going to try to get her some asprin tonight.

I just saw this...


http://www.osterpro.com/Product.aspx?id=groomer&cid=1064&scid=0&pid=7554

I did have that happen with one of my dogs before. A friend who is a groomer said that their nails are very sensitive and just a bit into the quick can hurt a lot - some dogs more than others. I stopped clipping them and started using a dremel. A lot of people on here use them too - it files instead of clips. Personally, I think, unless your clippers are really really sharp and you do it quickly, it does smash the toenail and hurt a lot of the time. Kasey sits still for the dremel a lot better than he can tolerate the clippers! I just got mine at the home improvement store. It works a lot better than those files made for doing dogs nails.

I agree. A $20 battery operated dremel from Walmart and marker training has made trimming nails a breeze around here! Once your pup heals, this might be a good transition.

Well an update! This morning she was at least putting weight on the foot again, so I was pretty relieved.

However, this afternoon I noticed a spot of blood on her foot and it wasn't that close to her dewclaw. Upon further investigation I discovered that one of her pads had some kind of abrasion on one side, almost on the toe, in a really hard-to-see spot! She has been licking her paws so much that she must have cleaned away all the evidence before I checked it last time!

Don't have a clear idea when it happened yesterday, but at least she seems to be feeling better and the dewclaw also looks pretty good. At least I know for sure it wasn't the nail clippers. I was puzzled why she seemed to be sensitive about the bottom of her foot anyway. It made me freak out and think infection.

It had to be the same paw...

I'd love a dremel someday