Any vets around? Dog lost dew claw & cut paw :(

[kippersmum]

Hi I would be very grateful for advice. My 17mo old border collie has managed to rip out a dew claw & also have a small cut between his toes. The small cut I can't see clearly, it is right in the crease IYKWIM, it bled a bit. The dew claw I spotted when checking his cut. It seems to be totally gone :( It hasn't bled at all, he has white legs & short coat so I would be able to see.

DDog is absolutely fine, no limping, pestering DD1 for roast chicken! Totally normal.

We did a long outing this afternoon, 1.5 hours on shingle beaches with some sharp rocks (DD ripped her leggings), quiet back roads & grass headlands. DDog was totally bouncy throughout, as only a young collie can be! ;)

Do I need to worry?? My plan is to watch DDog closely & get him checked by a vet tomorrow morning, but I'm panicking slightly there may be an infection risk or something else I'm not aware of that might be an issue.

TIA

Checked again with DHs help. The base of the dew claw is there but the rest of it isnt. DDog is very bouncy... detailed examinations are a bit tricky, he thinks it is playtime!

It happened to one of ours (base of claw still attached) and it never crossed our mind to go to the vets.

If it had been completely ripped out then yes in case a stitch was required but it sounds like he's absolutely fine

It'll be fine. Don't let him lick at it. Keep an eye on it and as long as it doesn't look swollen or discharging then it'll be fine - it's just a cut.
Bathe it with a bit of warm salt water if you need to clean it up.

Vet nurse here. Are you saying that all that is there is the quick and the hard shell part is gone? If so that is good. The new claw will start as a V at the top and gradually come down and round the quick. The quick regresses somewhat during this process too once it gets air dried and realises it has no protective covering. Infection risk is negligible. at my current practice if all we see is the quick we leave well alone. If it's bugging DDog, put a kiddies sock over it, lightly sellotaped into place while the drying out process is happening (two or three days only) after that. Leave it. I have worked in practices where the vet insists on taking a pair of nail cutters and lopping the whole lot off hard up against the toe. As you can imagine it is excruciating. I have worked in lots of practices and about a third of them do this which leads to a sort of deformed 'cauliflower' claw IME. In the wild, claws must lose the outer sheath frequently and they come back AOK though. Sometimes animals get better in spite of what we do not because of what we do I guess Hope that helps.

Thank you everyone for your advice. DDog is currently sulking due to me not letting him finish the roast chicken, his paw & claw are totally fine. Jimmy, he has lost the hard bit but has the quick, just as you describe.

I live in a coastal area, can I do a beach walk tomorrow as the easy option to bathing a collie pup foot in salt water ;)

thanks all for your help

Hi Kipper yeah beach'll be fine. The pink bit will shrink all the quicker with a bit of beach!

In my area we do treat all exposed quicks with antibiotics as we know that there is tetanus in the soil in our area and have had dogs die from tetanus. So we wish to prevent this.
As Jimmy says if the actual nail has gone I do no further trimming, I only trim away fractured nail as this can be more painful as it wobbles around.
I would speak to your own vet as they will know your local risk factors.

This happened to mine.
There was a hell of a lot of blood.
I didn't bother with a vet, I washed it with saltwater and kept an eye on it.
If it hadn't started looking better then I would have taken her in.