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Swollen jaw on baby fawns

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TammyKelley

Joined Jul 2015
39 Posts | 0+
Texas
I am a sub permitted wildlife rehab specialist under Kim Johnson with The Drift Inn Sanctuary in Wimberley Tx. licensed through the Texas Parks and Wildlife Dept. We are having a crazy year this year with our baby fawns.  Our fawns are getting a swollen jaw on the check side mainly on the top jaw but some are showing the lower jaw.  We lost a few fawns early on do to some bad milk from DuMor that was 14 months expired when purchased from feed store.  We changed milk and fawns were doing well but I recently had to buy the DuMor brand again and now our fawns are experiencing this swollen jaw problem could this be a milk reaction.  We are treating them with Clavamox (amoxicillin) 1cc 2xday.  Or is this what you call bottle jaw?  What is the best treatment? We have never seen this before in all the years we have been rehabbing fawns.    


 


Thank you for your time and wisdom.


Tammy Kelley


www.thedriftinn.org


512-738-1926
 

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Looks like lumpy jaw to me (fusobacterium). I treat mine with .5cc baytril and .5cc draxin. Clears up in 3 days. I usually treat before its that big though..as soon as I catch it
 
No bottle jaw is a worm infection and treatable by worming.  What you have is fuso bacteria which is in the ground.  Abscesses that big drain well when lanced.  Yellow to green puss will be in there.  Bens treatment should work for you.  I would also use a vaccine for fuso bacteria which will protect them if it is the same strain of fuso bacteria.  Josh Newton has a good vaccine which was made from deer farmers with the same problem.
 
I don't know of any way to ttreat the ground, Fuso is naturally found in most soils.


 


I'd not lance it if it goes down with the meds mentioned.
 
We have had two fawns just kill over with no symptoms and then these girls are all infected.  Does this spread easy.  I have a new very young buck that has no signs of anything wrong.  Should I quarantine him? 
 
As dtala said the bacteria is in the ground so not very treatable.  I personally myself feel a large puss pocket like that will either blow itself up over time as puss will not be absorbed back into the deer system or you will control the breakage of the puss pocket by lancing it.  I like to collect the puss up so it isn't spread back on the soil.  Nature will break the puss pocket sooner or later as the skin gets tighter the blood flow will kill some part of the abscess and will let it drain.


Either way you go antibiotic treatment is required.  I would lance it but that is me.  There is a cattle fuso vaccine that might help if it covered the bacteria in your area to protect those that don't have it yet I'd give it a try.  Like I said the one from Josh Newton has worked well for me but I don't think you have enough deer to warrant the cost of fifty doses..
 
I have 4 fawns left.  Can we treat with just one of those antibiotics or do we need to treat with both?   I started them on baytril yesterday but our Vet was going to switch them today but after I shared this info he decided to leave them on it.  The fawns weigh around 10-12 lbs so we were giving .7cc once a day.  I am so heartbroken over the ones we have lost and I want to do my best to save those we still have.  It a tough job as a lot of these fawns come to us already in bad shape so when we get them moving up hill and then have a set back like this it is a big blow.  I really appreciate all your help and wisdom.  
 
Tammy, I didn't read the first part earlier about the replacer. My advise is to drop the replacer entirely and feed em straight Vitamin D milk straight from the grocery store. It causes 100X less problems from bloat and scours. And is 1000X easier to use.
 
I did switch them to whole goats milk from the store but it is expensive but I will do what ever if it's best for them.  When you say Vitamin D milk are you meaning cows milk?  
 
I think that's what they mean, referred to numerous times as red cap milk. Lot of deer farmers seem to use it with good success from what I've been reading on various posts. I'm new to deer farming and had decided to use Superior milk replacer and baby has been doing well on it (2 weeks old today), no scours though she drinks more than chart says to feed.


Stay away from raw goats or cow milk. At least in goats I know there's a risk of e-coli and probably other diseases.


And I  would quarantine the new buck, just in case. Shouldn't every new animal be quarantined anyway to prevent transmission of diseases?
 
Make sure to get rid of the nasty puss and crap you drain out of jaw. You already have a problem and by squirting that crap all over your ground sure wont help ya out. I always just use an 18 guage needle and a bigger syringe to suck the crap out, then i squirt penicillin into the wound and suck that back out and squirt into something you can dispose of..Repeat,Repeat,Repeat until all looks good with no puss visible. 


 


Bottlefeds you could lance and keep wound clean from flies. They can be very nasty wounds..
 
So what about the 2 meds.  do you give them both to catch both sides of the spectrum?  I have only been giving them Baytril.  Is there another drug that is just as effective as draxin?  


 


If the abscess is small should I lance it as well or let the body heal with the meds?  
 
Ok so we just lanced the one fawn who's photo I attached and no puss came out.  Only blood.  Any ideas???   This is really making us scratch our heads.  We have never seen swollen jaws like this before and now that it's been lanced I don't know if it is "lumpy jaw".


 


We started seeing the problem pop up when we switched the milk replacer brand to the DuMor brand.  Have you ever heard of milk being contaminated?  I just gave the third injection of Baytril and not seeing anything change.  
 

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