July 1st half

Posted by: Tamandua Girl / Category: , , , , , , , ,

Found an orphaned raven fledgling in the yard. He gapped for me and got some water and food but didn't make it through the night. The smell of death upset Pua.

Fruit frenzy;

Oh my speaking of fruit we got to talking the other night and didn't watch Stewie like I should and then heard "ting" and went and he had raided the fruit bowl. He went into a frenzzy apparently as he mangled a couple apples and several bannanas and almost everthing else had claw marks in it too, lol. We had fruit smoothies for breakfast and took the worse and blended it up for him as treats.

Still concerned over Pua's early cycle.

7/3
No scent right now other than blood. Tamandua blood. I've only smelled her blood but it's different than other animal or human blood I've smelled. What I meant by a scent difference is normaly when she is spotting from her cycle there is a scent. She smells like an old bologna sandwich(is my best description) and Stewie does seem to like the scent of her then. She doesn't smell like that now and he doesn't show the same intrest in her. Otherwise she seems fine. She snuggles then is active awhile and plays with Stewie. Her schedual is a bit off though as she is now waking in the early mornings wanting someone to play with her and give her attention but no one feels like it then. That is due to the trip and the weird hours they kept(in a nocturnal animals oppenion).
Her appetite is good and I think that would be the first thing to go if she were feeling ill. She's always been fenicky and tricky about that. She gets PMS and often will stop eating and do little but sleep for a day or more just before she starts spotting. If something's off like when we first got to Canada she wont eat much either. And of cpourse if I don't mix the food the her liking she has to get used to that batch. So she's eating good now and active and there haven't been signs of infection yet so that's why I'm not panicing especialy after talking to a vet and her thinking it's okay, though did give her the wrong time frame but nothing to do if it is a misscarry.
But blood can be caused by an infection and you are right on spotting during pregnancy not being to uncommon. Actualy spotting still on a cycle is not common but does happen acording to anecdotal evidence of many people claiming it happened to them. Looked into that before because she did keep spotting on schedual when she had her false pregnancy but this isn't on schedual.
If it continues or there are any changes other than stopping then I'll have her seen.

7/4
Well a Tamandua cycles monthly, has the same type of uterus we do, only one baby at a time normaly, even both only have two nipples, and we must share some pheramones in common based on m exerience. So I have been looking into spotting irregularities in humans seems the best bet at getting a good guess at what's going on.
Possabilities
infection, usual only a very light spotting on tissue when you wipe, usualy accompanied by itching or some other discomfort
Stress or diet changes, can cause the cycle to be early or to late
Implantation bleeding, eeg burrows into the uterine lining can cause bleeding about two weeks after a period(one week past ovulation) but can vary in individuals. The spotting is lighter flow and color wise from a period(though some report old blood, brownish flow) and lighter flow wise from a period and smells different.
Well everthing fits with implantation bleeding, odd as that seems to me. It's even the right timing for when it started. Says based on statistics average length for that is 6-13 days. That long could have me freaking out but her periods can vary from a couple days to just over a week. And it did say that can be a sign of fertility. If you missed ovulating you may have a shorter period. Learned all kinds of things people don't normal talk about.
Second choice is due to stress and diet she cycled early but the smell is different and the timing right for the other. No signs of infection so that's least likely.
There is the slim chance of something like a cycst but don't think that's very likely. If it doesn't stop we'll go have her checked. Might check for an infection and or ultrasound her like Quasi's vet said to look for pregnancy signs.
She is having weird cravings, lol, blue cheese and now last night she wanted some survival cake. It's lemon cookie flavored bars with lots of calories and vitamines in it to replace meals in an emergence. Mixed some in water for her and she really enjoyed it.
I was nice to her last night and took her for a walk around the neighborhood. Found a dropped ritz cracker covered in ants and she enjoyed a snack then asked me to find her more. She talked me into a nice long walk. I swear she walks better than my dogs most of the way :) When we got back she played with Stewie and fell asleep in the chair but played a bit more after a short nap then settled in. I took a pic of her in the chair but not uploaded it yet.

7/6
Pua taught Stewie
how to open the fridge. And he does get into things in there. He thinks she's teaching him how to be a real adult Tam but she's just teaching him to be a bigger pain in the butt :P Put something in front of the door. Now hes frustrated.
Stewies cute side

He's just so cute when sleeping

Long hard day at work

Grooming bunny

Prize in the box

Yawn, it's hard work doing inventory

Stewie found a nice place to sleep this was up on a shelf and he burrowed in. Had to take a bag of top off him to see him

Go away I'm trying to sleep

Stretching

Quick nap

Purr...fect anteater

Yawning again

7/7


I called and someone answered and said she'd note it on Pua's chart and let the vet know to call. I just said I wanted to talk with him about it. I could have made an apointment I'm sure but I'd like to talk with him first so we have some idea what we want to do when we go in, samples first, jump right in and ultra sound or what? I wont likely be hearing anything till Monday anway as it's already past noon and they close early on Sat. I did take her temp today and she slept through it, lol, lucky her. It was normal 93.2 normal for her 93.6 but being sound a sleep it's normal for the temp to be lower. So no fever and another thing to make infection unlikely. Her pee is nice and clear so if it is an infection it's vaginal and not urinary. I can still for see them wanting a sample so they can rule it out for sure.
Bleed out is highly unlikely as she's not had that problem since getting her well and on a good diet. She's had her wounds and scrapes with no abnormal bleeding. Plus Stewie is on the same diet but he's never been wounded or scraped. Did nick his quick when filing once, his are right near the tip and he didn't have any problems clotting either.
So leaves me with the most likely a vaginal polyp(sadly kind of common in anteaters) or baby issues, good or bad. I lean to the second and certainly would prefer that. For any of those, diagnosis would require an ultrasound so feel like jumping right in and doing that but that will mean shaving her belly and likely sedating her and I hate that idea too. *sigh* Only other option is to put that off till infection is ruled out and don't like the idea of putting it off since I don't think it's infection but Aside from a growth the ultrasound wouldn't show anything we could fix/change but would put the mind more at rest.
So you can see why I need to discuss this with the vet first. I lean to just schedualing an ultrasound since think we will need to anyway so we could just take care of everthing in one trip. Would be nice to try doing it without sedation but it can be tuff to hold them still if the don't want to be. Hmm if she could just be standing there and run the wand underneither I could feed her blue cheese :)
Well, will know more by Monday. If the spotting hasn't stopped will know for sure something is more off than just cycling early because spotting from that shouldn't last that long.

7/8 (is the cycle like with dog?)
But dogs cycle twice a year(some breeds only once like wolves) whether there is a male or not. Tamanduas cycle monthly. Official word is two to three days but Pua has had longer cycles more longer spotting in the fall(their breeding season in the wild) and spring and just occasional other seasons. A time of longer spotting would indicate being more fertile but it only lets you know after, like after a missed ovulation then you would have a shorter lighter spotting.
She started her "period" on the 15th and lasted a couple nights light spotting but then the twenty 8th(stewie ripped a lot of my number buttons off need to try and fix that later) she started spotting not the in heat scent she has normal only smell the blood if I sniff that. Sometimes it's light mucas with some blood most times it's just blood but it's very light last night was a little heavier as a bit wiped off on Stewie it's varied a couple nights she didn't spot at all.
I was reading up on placental formation in anteaters and tamanduas and with all the blood flow changes and new vesel growth ect it wouldn't be surprising to have implantation bleeding or early pregnancy bleeding so I'm hoping that's what it is. The only other thing that seems to fit in my mind is a vaginal polyp but would hope not.

Cheese?
They both showed some intrest when I had something with cheese like pizza. They had catering on set and one day they had a tray of cheeses so got some of each to try on Stewie. I had all the treat cups in the sink to wash that night and she went and raided the sink going after the blue cheese cups only. Normaly she wont eat anything but ants and her food she ate an orange once but that was it and not much intrest in any fruit like Stewie.

Anteater Fun

Action anteaters

Not a great shot but lots of interesting foot, hand and tail action

Serious hand poking by Pua

They were drawing me into it last night and both poking at m feet as they wrestled each other. I could just imagine a big ball of tamanduas rolling around the jungle, lol The also had fun poking m dad's feet who is VERY ticklish.

Oh Boy, found some meal worms

He got it open but seemed more interested in the saw dust with them.

Hey, I'm trying to sleep here

he sleeps there, goes into his cage on his own to sleep in the hammock and toda is on the closet shelf

Nap time

She had awalk earlier and was playing with Stewie when she fell a sleep

Have you forgotten you're nocturnal?

It was after eleven and Pua had been up since nine thirty

early morning snack

You're all wet

Quasi had just been sprayed with neem flea spray

Napping with Grampa

Pua needed a break from Stewie and found sanctuary with her Grampa

Safe in Grampa's arms

7/10 Pua sees vet

And we are just about as clueless as before but feeling better about it having her seen. He felt her uterus which felt normal, looked at and into her private bits as much as he could and weighed her and all was well. Since everything is 100% with her aside from the spotting he wasn't worried yet and said give it a week. He expects it to stop by then and if not then we can ultrasound her and see if we can see anything. Said if she's good we likely wont need to sedate her. I used blue cheese to get her to sit still for the check today and he said that should work fine and we may get lucky and not even need to shave her but we'll just have to try and see.
My homework is, if she spots tonight to get a slide to bring in and he'll check for signs of anything other than blood. He said he could have tried swabing inside her but there wasn't much point to stressing her when there's no signs of infection.
His options were, just one of those mysterious female thenings, maybe not in those exact words lol, a funky hormone reaction to having a male around, a bit from her last cycle that didn't shed and her body is tring to clean it's self out. if it doesn't go away then his worry was possibly an ovarian cycst/polyp. That would be a pretty big worry for me.
She had pin worms real real bad when we got her per that last vet, the numbers in the sample were 'remarkable'. Well it happens some in humans too but a study showed in autopsied wild tamanduas a few females had pin worms in their overies. What happens is they migrate to the anus to lay eggs and sometimes get lost and go up the wrong passage and their being there can cause the ovarian cycsts. This is more likely to happen in an animal like tam where pritave bits are smack dab next to their anus. So if an ovarian cycst and not a vaginal one could have it checked for pin worms if it needs out but if it's from pin worms the likely hood is it would effect both overies and then I'd likely have her spayed since her chances of conceiving would be bad and her cycles are kind of hard on her and he had mentioned before just showing his knowlage of them that he had operated on them before and they do good. She'd probably be the first one ever spayed though if it did turn out badly. Really hopeful it's not that though but darn he had to bring it up and make me think about it.
Still hopefull it's from early pregnancy instead. He didn't really bring that up except to ask if I'd seen them mating or trying too. I'm fairly certain he thought it though maybe as a slim possablity but didn't want me to be thinking it and have it not be that, though I already am anyway. Just reading him as when he was listing possablities he paused a few times like he was avoiding saying something but didn't feel ominous.
So we're back to just wait and see *sigh*
He was in surgery all day Monday and didn't call so made an apointment for today. He said was just a lot of complicated surgeries and to keep calling and harrass him till he calls me back, lol. I like that he'd say that though because I do feel like I'm harassing a vet to keep calling when I know they're busy with important stuff so it's cool he'd encourage me to "harass" him :) Just a little thing to make me feel even better about him as our vet.
--
Yep she went through a false pregnancy last year. My best guess on that was that she may have gotton pregnant right before capture and lost it due to all the illness and stress but her body went through the motions anyway. She even had false labor and mothering phase after, licked everything in site. She skept spotting on a monthly shcedual then but everthing else screamed pregnant. This is the first time to be off schedual like this or spot this long.
Reading up on implantation and placental formation it's more surprising all pregnancies don't have early pregnancy bleeding from that, than that some do. It's not a big worry either as in humans first trimester bleeding is fairly common and the odds of misscairage are the same as in over all pregnancy so doesn't really increase the chances unless it's real bleeding and not just spotting like she is. I'm still leaning that way, hoping :)
Poor kid is wide awake now, we threw her sleep schedual off. Well she was groomed and went back to bed.
I believe Stewie is old enough but they do not know sexual maturity of males. zoo statistics say Females mature at about a year so is likely the same for males or a little sooner. He's right at a year now from what I understand but didn't get his exact birth date. Does seem he's not got it right yet. Saw him try once getting things lined up back in May but otherwise he does love her smell and getting on her back during her spotting from her normal cycle. But one paper on a pair put together was only together supervised. They never saw any more than 'failed' atemps but she got pregnant after a year anyway, both were young when put together. So not seeing it means little especial since they are not watched all the time.

7/10 anteater crack
well it's official blue cheese is addicting. They are acting like little blue cheese whores. Stewie learned to open the fridge and he got the blue cheese. He got into a second little fridge I have in here and put some blue cheese in due to the main house fridge went funky till my dad fixed it. He got the blue cheese opened two containers and they shared it all over the floor. But caught them and salvaged most of it to be used for them now. 5am Pua woke me up for a feeding and found Stewie had raided my fridge again. Figured I forgot the paint can last time I got them food but nope. They raided the fridge again tonight. Should have known something was wrong when they were so nice and quiet, lol. I water down their blue cheese so Pua can drink it. Blue cheese mess all over. Stewie got a bath. Pua was involved but not so bad. Put paint can back and he opened the door the paint can sliding. He's a strong little guy. Will need child proof fridge latches. Got stuff piled in front of the fridge tonight.

So something wakes me and first thing I see is Stewie spraweled over the closed laptop. It's 80 in here already, he must have been really hot and no idea why, lol.
Then I hear Pua cry. Rushed over to see why and she's standing by the fridge.
"whoa is me!"
so you're crying over spilt blue cheese?
"I got it open a crack all by my self and was so proud but the door was stuck there. I reached in and knocked the container down with my claw and pried the lid off and can claw the blue cheese and lick my paw but I can't really get at it, and where's the watery part?"
you ate that in the first raid
so clean up what's left of the blue cheese this time and close the door a whole line of things weadged against it and a big box.
"hey look this paint can makes a nice little ledge to stand on and get better leverage"
haha no concept that you can't open the door without moving the can you stand on. Then Stewie joins her to help and does the same.
But then they swarm all over it and start clawing the rubbery seal and I can imagine that shreaded by morning so the two of them got sent to jail(cage time) for B&E and petty theft.

7/12
Still had some trouble yesterday with them. Pua was eating came back and she was gone found her a bit later IN the fridge with it open a crack. They didn't eat much and kept getting time outs in the cage for clawing at the fridge. Tonight they are hungry enough they are eating real food again.actualy Pua is pigging out she's been eating since she got up.

She ate for about 2hrs this evening when she got up. She normaly eats like a bird several small meals through the night. She went back for seconds after playtime and before bed for about a half hour each. She's got a little pot belly now.

7/13 She ate so much she slept through the whole night.
Stewie was cute this morning. Woke up hungr to was licking his paws and the blanket he was under in the basket(his favored sleep spot). I pet him so he started licking m hand and when I came back from brushing my teeth gave me french kisses. After lots of tossing and turning and licking and stretching he finaly got over his lazies enough to get up and eat. He's still a pain about being picked up and latches onto anything as you pick him up, earning him the nick name of spider man on the set(producer/dirrector dubbed him that). So have found if I carr him basket and all to the cage and hold it up he climbs right out into the hammock, much easier. He's gotton good about being held once you have him though.

Speculation:
Pregnant? I feel fairly sure of it after finding a statistic for people. Most common cause for irregular bleeding in wemon of breeding(eh, child bearing)age is pregnancy. So compairing her to humans again since the repoductive system is so similar statisticly she is most likely pregnant.
She did throw up a couple times one night but I was using the simple food mix and her tummy is very sensitive. If it's the wrong fiber, not ground fine enough or not enough water it will come back out. I mixed it wrong not watery enough and used all flaxseed instead of adding beans because I was out. But that's just her. Stewie has no such problems. I added more water to it and it didn't happen again. They have their normal fancy mix now. I made a fresh batch just the other day.

I feel fairly sure of it after finding a statistic for people. Most common cause for irregular bleeding in wemon of breeding(eh, child bearing)age is pregnancy. So compairing her to humans again since the repoductive system is so similar statisticly she is most likely pregnant.
She did throw up a couple times one night but I was using the simple food mix and her tummy is very sensitive. If it's the wrong fiber, not ground fine enough or not enough water it will come back out. I mixed it wrong not watery enough and used all flaxseed instead of adding beans because I was out. But that's just her. Stewie has no such problems. I added more water to it and it didn't happen again. They have their normal fancy mix now. I made a fresh batch just the other day.

7/14
Stewie was sitting looking board later so put the leash on him and took him out front but he didn't like that either. Put him down at the end of the driveway and he wanted to go right back. So took him a house over where the sidewalk ends and set him down and let him walk back.

well if she's not I think Stewie will see to it she is. Pua left him to go eat and he came and tried to get her to play she just pushed him off and went back to eating. So he sniffed at her privates and then started licking them. She just ignored him still so after awhile he left. Notg really to sure what that was about.

7/15

Pua sat at the window and cried last night so took her in the ard a bit then got her into the woods today.

Stewie noon time today

He got up and ate and ran around the house for a bit, woke Pua up and went back to bed.

Pua's woodland walk

She was happy to be out and got moving quickly

Getting off track

Occasionaly she wanders off the trail

Fun with logs

Pua Queen of the forrest

I think I found some ants in here

Can't you see I'm busy?

Pua went in a hole in the side then peeked out the hole in the bottom. There was another hole up on the other side too. I suppose that tree wont stand much longer.

Fell asleep while digging for ants

Poor kid. I was watching in the bottom hole and saw her stand up on her rear legs and just stayed there. Got down and looked up in there and she was sleeping. Got the pick in the side hole. Her front half was supported on a ledge. Got her out and she was carried back the rest of the way and content about it. "I just closed my eyes for a second. Was just resting them before I dug more ants"

7/16 She has stopped spotting and the last couple nights Stewie keeps sniffing and licking her privates but more like she smells interesting more than appealing if I'm reading him right. He will sniff and lick but then might walk away after where as before if it was a good scent from cycling he'd be sniffing and right on her tail following her around and jumping on her back causing a play seasion. He will still follow her around and jump on her which is normal and doesn't seem spured on by her scent.

Another one of those little things that could be a couple different things but seems if you put all those little things together it adds up to fairly promising. Just have to wait a month and see if her body settles into cycling again or if she misses her next "period"

7/18
I think Pua just dreamed she was in her cage, she's in my shirt, gave a really loud upset hiss. I pet her she gave one more smaller one then settled back in. Stewie is rattling the cage playing around over there.

7/19
Pua fell asleep with me after breakfast at 7 but I woke up after 9 and she was in the cage sleeping with Stewie. She normally never goes in there on her own, might get locked in you know. I've noticed her seeking Stewie out a bit more. Went and found him in the closet the other night. He mostly sleeps on his own. She played with him then lead him back to bed with us. At the same time she gets annoyed with him more in the evenings because she wants to sleep more and he wants to play.

videos
Anteater Egg Carton fun
Anteater Egg Carton fun
05:26

7/20

Play time

Pua was sleeping late so he wrestled with me.

Attacking the rug

Who's next? I'll take you all on

Stewie will stand like this when playfighting then turn his upper body back and forth looking for someone to fling himself on.

Oh dear a cat

He kept sniffing her and backing up. He's leery of the other animals after his time away with just Pua and me.

7/20

She had that breakfast snack then woke up at noon and had a bit more then napped till one and got up again

Since she was up decided to take her for a hike again. We tried taking her to her traditional trail but she refused to go that way so we drove to the ranger station again but she didn't want to go that trail so we went across the lawn up the side road then back along the trail the opposite way. She went really slow at first and was jumpy but once we got onto the trail again she sped up. I think her mind is still arguing with her body about whether it's a good idea to be out of their territory if they got a bun in the oven to worry about :P At least it seems that way. Instincts saying you should be holed up somewhere safe and her mind still wanting to explore, so her still wanting out when she is awake at night. When we got home she had a bit more food, groomed then since I wouldn't snuggle in bed with her(I can't be in bed all day) she went and slept with Stewie in the hammock in the cage. Again not normal for her to go in there on her own but guess she really wanted to snuggle with someone.

Running down the trail

She found that hallow tree again

A snail and Pua in a tree

I've no good reason for liking this one but decided I do

All dirty from digging up ants

She did dig a burrow and try to curl up for a nap but I took her out and she walked back this time.

Tree climbing


Aw poor Pua maybe the walk wasn't such a good idea. She's still sleeping. Guess we wont be going for any more walks for awhile unless she really wants to go. Hard to resist a anteater crying in the window to go out. She really did enjoy herself today though once we just let her do her thing and she warmed up.



0 comments:

Post a Comment