Blanco’s Story
Story by Mana Stratton
Blanco is a 14 year-old
male, castrated, South American Alpaca (Lama
pacos) Llama cross (Llama
peruana)
and arrived at a zoological park with interdigital lesions to both front
feet in September 1993. On initial examination the veterinarian
described a foot rot like lesion in the interdigital skin of both
forefeet. The lesions were described as extensive with foul
smelling, oozing, serous discharge. Over the next ten years numerous
treatments were to be tried. Although at times some treatments would
appear to be fixing the problem nothing lasted. A special stable
complex and footbath facility was even built for treating Blanco. At
one stage the suggestion from a vet was the problem may be congenital in
which case he should be euthanased. By now though Blanco was very
much a member of the zoological park and the keepers continued to search
for a cure for his feet even trying alternative treatments. One was
a Kolorex cream (Forest Herbs Research Ltd) that was the most successful
of all treatments tried but it too was not enough and the problem
continued to occur.
Consequently Blanco’s
foot condition remained unresolved. It was worst during dry
conditions of summer, when the lesions dried out and cracked badly, or
during wet periods of winter/spring when the lesions got very soft and
tissue necrosis occurred with serous discharge. When the lesions
were at their worst Blanco showed signs of lameness. Blanco and his
companion Jodie, also a llama alpaca cross, were taken for walks in the
sea to try and help Blanco’s feet.
Last year (2003) as part
of my final year vet studies I was required to undertake a project on a
production animal or a herd that I had been involved in treating.
Having been involved at the zoological park where Blanco lived from my
school days I knew Blanco quite well having been one of the people that
used to walk him in the sea. Thus I asked one of the supervising
vets at Massey University if I could do Blanco as my project. I was
given the okay to do so and set to researching foot problems in llamas and
alpacas. I even asked breeders and was frequently told they don’t
have foot problems. However, I kept searching and slowly I started
finding evidence that llamas and alpacas can get foot problems but it is
not common.
When I undertook
Blanco’s case as my project I was hoping that by reviewing all the
treatment he had had and combining that with anything I managed to find
through the literature research I might just find something we had not
tried that could help Blanco. Initially things moved slowly but my
supervising vet tutor was very supportive, as was one of the other vets I
talked to about Blanco. During one discussion I was encouraged to
have a go at splinting Blanco and confining him to a stable. This
was something that had not been tried. It just so happened I had
arranged to go home for a week over our August/September break. I
immediately rang the curator at the park and informed her of the latest
idea. They were only too willing to give anything a go and set about
organising my ‘shopping list’ so that everything was ready for when I
arrived in a few days.
The first day I
successfully managed to measure up Blanco’s front feet for splints.
Fortunately with my mother being a pattern maker she was able to design
the pattern for my requirements for Blanco. Next stop was Ansco
Engineering who donated the aluminium needed for the splints. Then
it was a visit to my brother, a fitter and turner, who was able to cut and
bend the splints. I then spent the evening smoothing off the edges
of each aluminium layer and strapping the layers together to produce two
sturdy splints bent to fit Blanco’s feet. Earlier in the day I had
scrubbed Blanco’s feet and removed all dead tissue back to healthy tissue.
This I did with local anaesthetic while Blanco was sedated. His feet
were then dressed and he was kept stabled overnight.
Day two the splints were
put in place. Putting them on was a bit of an episode! Once
the splints were on Blanco did not really care about them but he didn’t
think much of being confined to a stable. Day three and it was
change the foot dressings, clean the feet with surgical scrub and reapply
the splints. By now it was becoming clear the stable was not really
suitable for what we were trying to achieve and the changing of the
splints on a daily basis was not easy. Although I had plenty of
willing keepers to help with holding Blanco or passing me equipment while
I changed his splints, everyone was having doubts as to how it would work
once I left in another 2-3 days.
Now the passing comment
my supervising tutor had made before I came to visit Blanco came to mind.
My tutor had suggested I bring Blanco back with me in my suitcase?
Back in the park’s office the curator and I pondered over how we could
possibly get Blanco to Palmerston North. The Cook Strait was our
problem. Had Blanco lived somewhere in the North Island one of the
keepers would have gladly transported Blanco by horsefloat. However,
Blanco lived in Nelson, which meant a large cost trying to get him across
that stretch of water. We looked at a number of options playing with
figures to work out how Blanco’s trip could be funded. Then in
walked one of the keepers and mentioned that we were a port city and there
had to be a boat going to Wellington from here that would take him.
With that we picked up the phone book and started walking the yellow
pages. Next minute the curator phoned Strait Shipping and told them
Blanco’s situation. The answer was be at the wharf at 11pm that
night and they would show us where we could put him. If it were
suitable they would take him on Friday night, along with myself, free of
charge. We could not believe it.
Now it was a phone call
to Palmerston North to my Dad who was in my flat looking after my animals
so I could visit Blanco. We made arrangements for him to meet us at
Wellington harbour with a horsefloat. He also started converting a
shed into a stable for Blanco.
Friday night Blanco had
to walk onto a float for the first time in 10 years. This he did
without even batting an eye even though it was by torchlight. Once
at the wharf we put a thick layer of straw into his temporary stable for
the 10-hour journey by ship. He just made himself comfy and sat
throughout the journey not worrying about a thing.
We arrived in Wellington
early Saturday morning and the crew of the Straitsman were very patient as
I walked Blanco off the ship and onto the wharf. Here was Blanco
complete with splints on both his front feet, which were then covered in
plastic to keep them dry with old thick woollen socks on top to give him
some traction. Well Blanco had never been to the capital before so
it was take two steps, have a look, take another two steps, have another
look and so on all the way up to the wharf.
Within a week of
arriving in Palmerston North I was able to remove the splint from Blanco’s
right foot which had always been the better of his front feet. I
continued to treat it for another 4 months with Malaseb (Phoenix Pharm
Distributers Ltd) and Vetadine (Bomac Laboratories Ltd) and then just
water and Aloe First (Forever Living Products). However, the left
foot was to prove to be more of a challenge.
Soon after arrival in
Palmerston North the treatment for his left foot was altered from daily
dressing with a dry pad to dressing it every two days with a saline soaked
pad that had to be kept moist every 12 hours. Thus I worked out a
way to insert a tiny piece of tubing into the top of the saline pad which
was then run up through the layers of splint padding coming out at the
top. It was then a simple task to syringe saline down the tubing.
As most of the time I was doing all these changes by myself I found things
like velcro and elastic garters were great for helping to hold things in
place while applying bandages. That way I did not have to worry
about bits of tape that invariably got stuck to me or the straw, or
bandages being unravelled as I tried to hold his leg plus the splint and
padding in place while he decided to move! Then an old sock over the
top to finish it off.
Initially the left foot
made great progress with this treatment but then complications set in.
The chronic swelling started to reduce, which was great, but it created
skin folds that caused pressure sores to develop plus secondary bacteria
started infecting the site. This resulted in the splint having to be
removed and dry pads only being used with a heavy support bandage.
Slow progress was made and after a few days I realised we were going to
lose the ground made through too much movement so I modified the splint to
reduce the risk of pressure sores and put it back on. Blanco was
then given a course of antibiotics. I syringe cleaned the foot daily
with soapy water as it was too sore to actually rub it and dried it by
just holding a towel over it. However, I was still not happy with
the lack of progress so I started investigating further. I looked
into vitamin supplements for him and any other treatment I could possibly
use. In the end I combined a number of things.
At this stage as Blanco
was stabled 24 hours a day and in full fleece I put him on Vitamix Liquid
ADE (Bomac Laboratories LTD) courtesy of Bomac. Yellow lotion (Ranvet),
Otocleanse (Vetpharm Ltd) and talcolm powder was also added to the
treatment regime. Now I was treating his foot 3-4 times a day and
was very grateful that my father had thought to rig up a light I could run
from my flat so I could see what I was doing in the stable. The
combination of these treatments saw steady progress being made. By
mid November all but about a 5cent area was healed. Thus I was able
to arrange that my neighbour could change the dressing with the help of my
father who had once again arrived to look after Blanco and my animals so I
could go down to Nelson for a long weekend.
On calling in to the
zoological park to see how Blanco’s mate Jodie was I found things were not
good. Ever since Blanco had left the keepers had been battling with
Jodie’s weight because he was pining for Blanco and just sat in his
paddock all day and eat anything within reach. Something had to be
done. Jodie was now grossly overweight.
Strait shipping again
came to our aid and took Jodie and myself through the night to Wellington
and once more my father was at the wharf with a float to collect us.
Jodie, like Blanco, had not been in a float for 10 years and although he
had a rough crossing he was not upset. Unfortunately he seemed to
have lost a lot of interest in life since Blanco’s departure.
This was to all change
very soon. On arrival to Palmerston North as soon as Jodie saw
Blanco he was off in a rush to him calling as he went. Blanco was
just as eager to see his mate and was trying to climb up his stable door.
Fortunately the stable was big enough to cater for Jodie and Blanco
because they had no intention of being separated again. At this
stage Blanco was still being stabled 24 hours a day with short periods in
a coral and his foot was still splinted although I was trying him in a
lighter splint during the day.
I put Jodie on a daily exercise regime as well as a diet.
However, after the first couple of days I realised Blanco was going to
damage his feet trying to climb out of the stable when left behind while I
took Jodie for a walk. My solution was to walk Jodie first thing in
the morning and take Blanco with us wearing the heavy night splint.
To prevent the bandages wearing out I put one of my old boots on his
splinted foot. Yes, the neighbours did find it quite amusing to see
us walking up and down the street with Jodie waddling behind me and Blanco
trotting along at my shoulder with a distinctive scuff, squeak, scuff,
squeak made by the boot he wore.
Within about a week of
Jodie’s arrival I was able to let him and Blanco walk around in the coral
during the day and just stable them at night. Blanco now wore a
lightweight splint during the day and the heavy splint at night and when
he went for his walk. Gradually I was able to change this to wearing
the lightweight splint at night and for walking and just heavy bandage
support during the day. Just as it looked like everything was
progressing well and almost healed a pussy spot broke out. Kolorex
cream was applied and within a few days it was clearing up beautifully.
Blanco was also put onto a Zinc supplement, Availa Zn (Vetpharm Ltd) at
this stage to help promote skin healing.
At last after 4 ˝ months
Blanco was down to a support bandage 24 hours a day. Gradually the
use of the support bandage was reduced until Blanco was free of any
support. Over the next few months I continued to treat Blanco’s feet
with a twice-daily scrub with water, drying and application of Aloe First.
Slowly this reduced to once a day then every second day. Now a year
from when I first put splints on Blanco I treat his feet once a week as
above. He also gets to run and jump in a paddock all day and
literally live life to the full. After years of low grade, chronic
pain Blanco loves being able to run. His feet have remained healed
now for 8 months.
Jodie has lost a lot of
weight. He is still carrying some extra weight but at least now he
looks like a llama rather than a round barrel with little sticks poking
out from underneath. Even he has started running. It has also
been agreed that providing I can keep both Jodie and Blanco together, in
my care they are to enjoy retirement for the rest of their life and enjoy
they do. The sight of seeing Blanco running full speed across the
paddock is so wonderful and I am very thankful to all the people who
helped in so many ways to make this possible.
Acknowledgements
Massey University
Veterinary Clinic Staff especially Dr. Allison Quinn, Dr. Vaughnan Seed,
Dr. Cameron Broome, Dr. Mark Collett, Dr. Alister Johnston, Dr. Patrick
Morel, Marie Hennesy, Sandy Marshal, and Debbie Delport. Help from
Nelson; Strait Shipping Ltd, Pegasus Shipping Agency, Natureland
Zoological Park, CRT Vet Services, Stoke Veterinary Clinic, Douglas
Stratton, Trevor Gribble, Ansco Engineering, Frances Stratton, Laine
Thompson and Joe Stratton. Help from Palmerston North; Copy King,
Foodtown, Southern Veterinary Supplies, Bernina, Tiritea Sawmilling Co
Ltd, Mitre 10, Steve’s Discount Bulk Barn, Pak ‘N Save, Foto First
Digital, Woolworths Rangitiki Street, Spotlight, The Worm, Kathy Mintrom,
K Mart, Thief Of Hearts Alpaca Stud, Melody’s New World, Prebble Seeds
Equestrian, Manawatu Evening Standard, Bryan Gaskin Fabrics. Help
from elsewhere; Phoenix Pharmaceutical Distributors Ltd, Bomac
Laboratories Ltd, Shoof Vet International, Richard Jakob-Hoff Auckland
Zoological Park, Ian Leadbetter Dannevirke Vet Services and Bayer New
Zealand Ltd.