Poorly nose and weight loss - Finally recovered!

[theia]

So I just got back from the vets with our littest gerbil Nia, I've been monitoring her for the past 5 days or so as about 5 days ago I saw that her chin looked red with either blood or mucus, couple of days later her nose started looking really red too so I weighed her and found she had lost about 4 grams from when I last weighed her back at the end of April. I decided to give her a couple more days just to be sure it wasn't simply an accidental scratch or bite or something, but it didn't get any better and today when I weighed her she had lost another 2 grams. As she was always tiny (probably the runt of the litter) and weighed a whopping 62 grams when I last weighed her while she as healthy at about 4 months of age, she couldn't really afford to be losing so much weight so fast so it was definately time to get her seen.

She is fine with eating sunflower and pumpkin seeds and gerbil chocolates (I've been giving her extra to make sure she was getting some sort of food as I haven't seen her eat recently), but she's been extra sleepy and when she's awake is almost constantly rubbing/cleaning her nose so it is definately irritating her somehow.

The vet checked her teeth and said they were fine, she listened to her lungs just in case and that checked out fine too, she's taken a sample to test for ringworm just in case but as her siblings are both fine it seems very unlikely. Basically neither of us can work out exactly what is wrong or what could have caused it...

For now I have painkiller (Inflacam) and antibiotics (Baytril) to give her for a week and see if it clears up and if not bring her back in. I also requested whether they had any special food while I was there as I had read about it on here and my main concern with her is how little she is/how much weight she has lost, so I also have a couple packets of Recovery Food to try and bring her weight back up.

The next challenge is to get all this stuff inside her, oh joy!

has anyone ever had anything similar to this? They haven't been given any new toys recently, but I suppose she could have hurt her nose on the wooden bridge or the tunnel or something?... Their bedding is dust extracted cardboard and tissue strips which they've always had so it's unlikely to be a sudden allergy or an injury caused by that.

[betty]

I'm not sure either. Like you said an injury seemed most likely, and as it irritated her she kept rubbing it? Allergies can just suddenly appear (although unusual) so I don't suppose it would hurt if you wanted to try an hypo allergenic bedding for a couple of months just to rule it out. But then if it goes away, you won't know if it was the bedding or the medication...

I would be interested to hear if it clears up on the meds.

As for weight gain, go for mealworms and sunflower hearts for her and cut out any 'empty' treats like breads and salady veg etc as they will fill her tummy but have little nutrients.

If the amount of meds is really small, put a raisin in a small dish and squirt the meds on that, mine all love raisins, even with sticky meds on them.

[theia]

Thanks for those awesome ideas Betty, as she's so tiny it's only a drop of each med a day for her and it's been a challange so i'll get some raisins and see if that idea works. I'll also see about getting her some emalworms while I'm out today. I've been giving her lots of extra sunflower and pumpkin seeds, no veg or bread.

I weighed her again just now and she's the same weight, so at least she hasn't lost any more which is something. Her nose maybe looks a little better today, I'm trying not to get my hopes up that it's working too soon as she was rubbing at it a lot agaian last night. She nibbles at the recovery food a few times a day, which is still better than nothing, plus I've seen her sat in the food bowl eating a couple times now and she seems more alert again during the day (digging and such). However my new concern is that she seems to be losing fur from behind her eyes, I'm going to keep an eye and see if that gets any worse/better, I wonder if she is also rubbing the fur there too much when rubbing her nose and thereby making herself bald or if there's another issue altogether there...

Her sisters on the other hand love the food and keep trying to steal it when I offer it to her (she won't eat outside the tank and it's too thick to syringe so I put it on a spoon) and they definately don't need to gain weight lol.

[johanne]

Another thing you might try that's worked really well for us is leaving a sand bath in the tank in an almost fully enclosed container (a fat glass jar with a narrow opening at the top, like from apple sauce). Rubbing herself in the sand should be less irritating than scratching with her paws. We haven't had a red nose stick around once since we started doing this. They seem to like hanging out in the jar too. Sand will be kicked out if you give them a container with straight sides or an overly large opening.

[theia]

Hmm, I do have some sand but not in their tank, I was worried that sand might get stuck and irritate her nose more if it was an open wound (as seems likely). But I do intend to sort out some sand for them once it looks healed/mostly healed as I'm sure they'd love a play and bath.

She's definately not rubbing around her eyes when she rubs at her nose so no idea what caused the fur loss around there, gonna grab her out and medicate her in a moment (hopefully using raisins) so I can take another look and see if that's getting any worse or not.

Edit: I don't think her eyes look any worse and I can see more clearly what her nose looks like. So the area that is annoying her is the bit between her nose and her mouth which I suppose would be her upper lip/philtrum area. She's rubbed all the fur off (comparing to her sisters she should have short fur everywhere except the actual nose itself) and the skin looks very red in a line across the upper lip but I can't see any reason for it too look that way. I do believe that she must have been making it bleed before with how red it used to look though, so fingers crossed it might be slowly getting better.

I managed to give her the antibiotics on a raisin but she wouldn't accept the painkillers that way, in the end I had to put a drop of that on an extra large sunflower heart. Unfortunately she refuses to eat mealworms and is still only nibbling at the recovery food sometimes so all I can do is keep giving her lots of sunflower seeds (not that I think she's complaining about that lol).

[johanne]

We use a very fine, soft sand so it can't irritate them.

Red in that area under the nose is usually not blood, but rather porphyrins. Small amounts is normal, but when there's enough to look red it's usually caused by stress (possibly from feeling poorly) or allergies. Question is what is stressing her. Does she need hiding places to get away from her cagemates occasionally perhaps? Tank cleaned too often and she's extra sensitive? Some gerbils are more delicate than others. For us the fine sand in the container idea has cleared it up for quite a few gerbils over the past year or two.

[theia]

Thanks for that info, she was definately rubbing it raw, she's been rubbing it less and less with the help of the painkillers and antibiotics and it does seem to be getting better, it's looking much less pink/red now. But the fur loss around the eyes could also suggest stress. She is the tiniest so she could be getting a little bullied by the other two, one of her sisters is also our biggest gerbil so she likes to throw her weight around when it comes to getting treats and such.

I clean them every two weeks and had recently cleaned them before she got ill. They have a wooden tunnel that I bury in the bedding to give them a safe den to hide in and they also usually make a separate bed/nest away from the hidden den, they have a couple levels to go on and I am planning to change the cage/tank topper up and make better use of the levels as well as add in a another wooden bendy bridge or two (I plan to make one level the bathing floor as currently it's not really utilised much, just a level to use to get to the top 'food' level, I just need to get the bridges and a suitable jar for sand). I'd also like to get another bigger tunnel to bury as they seem quite squished when they all cram into the current one, if I do maybe I'll bury both of them seperately rather than just replacing the current one. Or maybe the little one can rest on top of the bedding and the bigger one can get buried... plans and ideas

I've started taking them out more often now that the spare bedroom is tidied up enough that they can run around on the spare bed (I didn't want to use our bed as that is already used as a run around space for our other two girls and I didn't want to risk causing any problems by mixing scents). Our sand is probably bigger than yours, I've heard that fine sand can cause breathing issues and as one of our girls is definately highly sensitive to dust I had to get the biggest bathing sand grains I could find, but even having a new utilised level and a space to bathe when they want might be helpful for her to destress, hopefully I can get that arranged within the next week or so

[betty]

The Chinchilla sand they dust in is very fine and dust free so this is why it is perfect for gerbils - it feels 'like silk' when you run your fingers through it. Any 'dust' seen is actually the sand itself not actual dust...

The coarser sands that look more like those you might see on the beach or in a sand pit are also dust free - but they are not fine enough to get into the coat and actually clean it effectively. Chinchilla sand is more like talcum powder for humans and gets stuck in the coat soaking away the moisture and grease. Chunkier sand just can't do that.

[theia]

I do actually have chincilla sand, it's no way near as coarse as beach sand but I have heard of something like chinchilla dust or something that's super fine and can apparently cause issues? I went for the coarsest chinchilla sand I could find for this reason, in certainly isn't 'like silk' or talcum powder but it is much closer to this than beach sand and as they manage to track it all over the place after bathing I'm pretty sure it does the trick of sticking in their fur lol. In which case it might be okay for her nose, especially now it seems to be improving. Hubby got paid the other day so I'm planning a small shopping spree for myself next week, whilst I'm out doing that I'll look for a suitable jar to make an in cage bath for them, hopefully then I can get their home 'upgraded' within the next few days if I manage to find something suitable . The wooden bridges and new tunnel will have to wait though as I usually have to order them online.

[betty]

I used the word sand for comparison, but I actually use Chinchilla Dusting Powder from Pets At Home, and none of my gerbils have ever had any problems (and I have had a LOT of gerbils).

Obviously, stick with what you have if that's what you prefer, but just so you know that if you wanted to try something different if the nose trouble doesn't clear up, this may be something worth giving a shot.

Still not sure how this is related to the weight loss though? Has there been any weight gain on the new diet?

[theia]

Ah I see. Yeah I don't think the sand relates to weight loss, just a suggestion by Johanne that sand might help her nose. Unfortunately she still hasn't put any weight on, but she is at least staying stable at 56grams currently, she is being very fussy and flat out refusing meal worms and barely touching the special food

[betty]

Well at least if the sand clears up the nose that's one less thing to worry about.

What else is going on in her tank that could be keeping the weight off? She is either not gaining weight due to using all the calories (something external), or because her body isn't absorbing all her calories (something internal).

So you can try to stop the first one by changing her life style and see if it makes a difference. So you need to reduce her 'stress' levels and reduce her activity for a short while. To do this you need to think about where her tank is, how often she needs to move about and what else is going on in that tank. Just like if YOU are ill you sit in bed pretty much all day doing very little and on your own to recover, she needs to be able to sleep in peace, not be disturbed or made to walk about too much, and scatter feeding near her bed or nest so she doesn't have to hunt for it OR wait for others to feed first etc...

If she hasn't gained weight after a week or so of that, then perhaps her weight loss was something internal.

[theia]

Yes, hopefully we can sort out each problem, even if it is just one at a time.

That could be an idea, currently they have to climb right to the top to get to the food and halfway up to get to the water as I don't have a way of attaching the water lower down (tank base, I have to attach it to the wire topper). I could try moving the food down to the bottom then she would only need to climb for water, or I could scatter feed at the bottom and leave the other food stuff at the top for the other two if they still wish to climb. I just offered her some more recovery food and though I couldn't see her (she was hiding in the tunnel) it felt like she was eating off the end of the spoon and the spoon came up empty so hopefully she at least nibbled at it again. I was just thinking the other day that, for a Gerbil at least, putting on weight is probably a lot harder than losing it, so I expect the gain will probably be rather slow (if only it was that way for us ).

[theia]

Good news, she's put on a huge 2 grams, just 4 more to go before she's back to a good weight! She finished her meds today and her upper lip area is looking a fairly healthy colour as far as I can see (such a little wriggle butt), so now I will be keeping an eye on her just in case it does re-occur. The first test for ringworm came back clean and the second is due in a few days but neither I nor the vet are expecting them to find anything.

Edit: I just got back from shopping, I got them a bigger bendy tunnel to hide in and a jar for a sand bath. I've changed their cage up now and they're having fun exploring. I'm just waiting for their new bendy bridges to turn up so I can finish it off properly, I'll probably have to wire the jar in place just so I don't have to worry about them accidentally knocking it off the shelf and onto each other. Of course Mia and Isis have already kicked more than half the sand out of the jar (and mostly right onto Nia's head!). There's about 20% of the sand left in it and it's not even been 5 minutes

[theia]

After putting about 4 grams back on she's suddenly very lethargic again today and I can see that her nose has a scab on it and maybe another little one on her upper lip. She had still been rubbing at her nose but not as much and she had seemed more energetic again. One of her eyes also seems a little crusty and not as open as the other. On top of that all of a sudden today Mia the biggest one has started chasing her around the cage and I can't tell if she's trying to oust her out of the clan or if Nia is just over-reacting and running away for no reason. Isis has put herself between them a couple of times, blocking Nia off from Mia but on the times when Mia has got to her nothing seems to happen, I can hear Nia squeaking but as far as I can tell Mia isn't attacking her (no injuries beyond her nose) and she was grooming her just last night.

I've called the vets and asked if it's possible to get a phone consultation with the nurse (turns out she was a nurse not a vet, which makes me even more impressed with her level of care and attention) who saw her last as I want to ask if there is anything else she can think of to look at/do or if it wouldn't be worth the hour long bus each way (which is very jolty) and stress involved for Nia.

Currently waiting for a call back...

Edit: she's drinking a ton of water while the other two are sleeping, she's been at the water bottle for at least 10 minutes straight now (possibly as much as 15). She really did seem fine yesterday, I changed their sand bath and they all got up and had fun exploring the slight changes to the cage, I gave her lots of sunflower seeds last night before I went to bed to help her with some more weight gain. Husband says Mia was running around the cage a lot last night too (probably chasing Nia like she has been today) so seems that that started up last night and maybe that's why she's so tired? The weather is pretty hot here as well so she's probably a bit overheated and thirsty and maybe didn't feel safe enough to drink with Mia up and about? I do think she's more likely over-reacting to Mia's attention though and it's probably stressing her out and making herself ill? Hopefully the scabbing means her nose is finally getting given the chance to heal but the crusty half closed eye is a little concerning with her lethargy.

Edit2: Just took her out to have another quick look at her, which woke Mia up, when I put her back in Mia came to climb up the same way/same bridge and Nia chose to take a completely different route to avoid Mia even though Mia did absolutley nothing toward her. From what I can tell Mia seems to be the one presenting her butt to Nia as if Nia is the one being agressive, she seems to be claiming the smaller 'den' as her own and not letting the other two join her (when normally the three of them would prefer to sleep together in the small den).

Edit3: Had the call back from the nurse, who said the only thing we can do at this point is try her on a longer course of painkillers and antibiotics (so I'm glad I didn't take her all the way in just to get that diagnosis). Unless of course I think she's going too far downhill in which case she would recommend putting her down. I've chosen to try another course of meds as she doesn't seem too unhappy at this point but I will continue to monitor her weight (and her relationship with her sisters of course). I'll be going in to the vets to collect the meds tomorrow, fingers crossed they clear everything up this time and hopefully make her feel less antsy about sharing her bed with her sisters.