trampledbygeese
Loving the herd life
Wondering if you can help give me ideas how to diagnose what's wrong with my alpaca.
We have a few rescue animals on our farm, including two very large llamas (1/2 again as large as the ones at the local agricultural fair) and two alpacas. One alpaca would be considered large, and the other is ... well, how to describe it. Think of the largest llama you've ever seen and add 20%. This thing is a good 8 to 10 inches taller than our llamas. Both the local camelid gurus say it's an alpaca, but ... I don't know... something about it being castrated too young. Being rescues, it takes 3-5 people to catch and handle them - we've really tamed them, the first year it took 12 people.
The problem: Last night his cheek was suddenly all swollen and flabby one one side. About 5 or 6 times regular size and only on one side of his face. He's still eating his Text and hay, though he isn't as assertive as normal. No pain behaviour, nothing wrong with walking, just a massively lopsided face.
I don't know if it's related, but he's been starting fights the last 5 days. He never usually starts fights, but every now and again, he tries to bite the llamas' faces.
Any thoughts on what else I can look at to figure out what's wrong with him? Some good search terms to start with? Still waiting for a reply from my llama lady, so I'm really lost as to what to do.
Catching him is a real pain and we don't have any local vets that deal with alpacas. However, if I can identify what is wrong and how to treat it, I can buy the meds for him.
Thank you in advance.
We have a few rescue animals on our farm, including two very large llamas (1/2 again as large as the ones at the local agricultural fair) and two alpacas. One alpaca would be considered large, and the other is ... well, how to describe it. Think of the largest llama you've ever seen and add 20%. This thing is a good 8 to 10 inches taller than our llamas. Both the local camelid gurus say it's an alpaca, but ... I don't know... something about it being castrated too young. Being rescues, it takes 3-5 people to catch and handle them - we've really tamed them, the first year it took 12 people.
The problem: Last night his cheek was suddenly all swollen and flabby one one side. About 5 or 6 times regular size and only on one side of his face. He's still eating his Text and hay, though he isn't as assertive as normal. No pain behaviour, nothing wrong with walking, just a massively lopsided face.
I don't know if it's related, but he's been starting fights the last 5 days. He never usually starts fights, but every now and again, he tries to bite the llamas' faces.
Any thoughts on what else I can look at to figure out what's wrong with him? Some good search terms to start with? Still waiting for a reply from my llama lady, so I'm really lost as to what to do.
Catching him is a real pain and we don't have any local vets that deal with alpacas. However, if I can identify what is wrong and how to treat it, I can buy the meds for him.
Thank you in advance.