Deer Vet
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Eye
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Australia
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1 |
This morning when I went to feed my 3 month old male |
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Fallow Der I noticed that both eyes are cloudy and bline in one eye, but still sight in the other. The cloudiness is more in the right eye which is the one that has no sight. His eyes are not
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weeping, he doesn't have a temperature. He seems his normal self. The milk I mix up for him is 1litre full cream milk, 1 egg yold (for the first two weeks only), 2 tablespoons glucose powder and 2 teaspoons cod liver oil. We're feeding him 500ml twice daily. He also has access to fresh clean water, oaten chaff, lucerne hay and grass.
Can you please help? |
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This is the sort of problem that is difficult to treat without seeing the animal. The cloudiness is corneal opacity which is usually due to an infection, trauma or an allergic reaction to something. I am guessing that you can probably rule out infection, but it really needs a close examination by a veterinarian with the right equipment. Can you not take him to a vet, even if he/she has never seen a deer close up. Perhaps you could convince him/her that it is just another we fawn in pain and the treatments used on a dog is woth a try.
(4 March 2011)
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| 2 |
I bought a couple of little doe fawns with a yellowish white matter in their eyes and tear duct. I gave them both an |
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antibiotic, but now I notice
it on some of my other stock. What is the cause of the mucus and how do I
treat it? P.S. the fawns still have it. |
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If the ocular discharge is not accompanied by changes to the eyeball itself
(cloudiness, ulceration) and the fawns are otherwise quite well, then it is
probably a simple conjunctivitis you are dealing with. This tends to
be most prevalent when the animals are run under hot, dusty conditions,
and/or when flies are bad. Most cases recover without treatment, but
some may require use of ocular antibiotic ointment. However, the
handling required for this type of treatment usually makes it impractical,
except in pet fawns.
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| 3 |
I have a fawn that is 4 days old. We found her with fly larva on
her bottom and navel. She has one very cloudy |
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eye and the other is half-cloudy. She appears to be blind.
What could have caused the problem of the eye? Can her eyesight be
saved? |
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If the fawn was flyblown, as you describe, it has clearly been through a tough
time. The cloudiness that you describe is due to the same sort of problem.
Almost certainly it began with traumatic damage to the surface of the eye,
resulting in a condition called keratitis. This condition usually responds to
treatment without causing permanent damage to the eye. A veterinarian can
prescribe appropriate medication if this is required.
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International
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1 |
I am involved with Wildlife Rehabilitation on Long Island NY and have been
rehabilitating fawns since 1988. I am |
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seeing an increasing number of fawns born blind. I was wondering if
you have any insight on this problem. I took one of the fawns to a
Veterinary ophthalmologist and he said that the optic nerves were frayed. |
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I wish that I could give you an easy answer to the problem that you describe,
but I cannot do so from this distance. There are going to be local issues of
environmental and animal health that only a thorough and close investigation on
the ground is likely to provide any answers for. It really depends on issues
like what proportion of the fawns are affected, are there differences between
localities, years etc and are there any known or suspected toxic or other
problems that might link in. There are probably no simple answers.
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2a |
I have a whitetail doe fawn which I raised since she was about 2 days old.
Recently, at about 2 months, I took her |
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to a friend who raises deer for her to live, and she is adjusting. I still
go up to give her a bottle twice a day. She is tamer than any dog I
know. One day when I went up I noticed her closing her right eye. I started
treating it with an antibiotic eye sib. After a couple days, without
improvement, the eye started turning blue. We gave her penicillin for 5 days
and still put the sib in. She has her eye open now but it is blue as
blue and I believe she is blind. Is there any hope for that eye? |
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The blue eye has corneal opacity, and is almost for certain blind or nearly so.
No further treatment is warranted. If the other eye is OK she will learn to get
around safely. |
2b
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Hello once again. I am happy to report that she regained complete eye color in her eye and I believe see can see out of it. I guess it took several
days after the penicillin injections for her eye to come back. |
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You must be pleased that the eye seems OK. |
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3a |
Recently I received a male fawn, approx. 9 weeks old. He was blind
from a heavy tick infestation of the eyes, |
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face
and ears. I eliminated the ticks and began SQ injections of B-12,
long-lasting Penicillin (daily for five days, LA200 (oxytetracycline) (3
doses, 1 dose every other day) and Ne0-Poly-Bac (non-steroid) ointment in
the eyes 4-6 times daily - which I am still administering. A previous fawn
with similar infections cleared up beautifully. This fawn however, has not
fared as well. One eye appears to have ulcerated and ruptured and is flat
and sunken. The other eye is round but quite white with a small,
irregular-shaped brown area at the bottom. The little guy is totally blind.
Is there any hope that vision will return to the better eye? Is there
any other protocol I should try? He is doing well otherwise and
continues to gain weight. He follows me and the other fawn around the yard
surprisingly well. Even when he bumps into things he doesn’t seem to
get discouraged and just tries another route. |
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The little chap is in desperate trouble I am afraid. You are correct about the
ruptured eye - it needs to be taken out but only if the other eye is OK.
It almost certainly is not OK, with only a small chance that it might regain
some sight. You will have to ask yourself whether it is humane to keep a blind
fawn.
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3b |
Thank you for your prompt reply. Right now the blind fawn is otherwise
in good health and is good company for |
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the other fawn. Upon release of the sighted fawn I will decide the
fate of the other (if no sight has been restored by then).
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