Won't stop picking at foot

[Twinkletoes]

Hello everyone, I've been trolling here for a while and have done quite a bit of thread reading. I'm posting because I've read a few threads regarding what my chin is doing now but haven't foind the answer I'm looking for.

Long story short, this afternoon I'm cleaning their cage and notice blood. Doing a little looking around I find that one if my chins is bleeding from one of their hind legs where it usually is calloused looking. Tonight I skipped play time because when I let him out during the cleaning earlier it started bleeding again because he was really active. I also noticed him picking at the leg and causing it to bleed again. I guess my question is , do they ever heal on their own? Is this behavior what they do in the wild when an injury like this occurs? I'm going to watch it for a day and see what he does but in the mean time I was going to try to keep his cage as clean as possible. Also, he doesn't like to be picked up or handled so is there anyway I can get him to stop picking at it? Or do I let it run its course. He's still eating and drinking like a rockstar but man, seeing blood in the cage is scary!

Sorry for the droning on and on.

 

[Twinkletoes]

good news, a lot less blood this morning. Has anyone heard of using corn starch or flour to stop bleeding? Also has anyone used blue-kote before on injuries? These chins are going to be spoiled this week with daily room service (cage cleaning)!

 

[Morselchip87]

I'm sorry I don't have an answer for you, but I'd be interested in what others have to say as well. This same thing seems to happen with my little guy too.

I first noticed the blood in his cage about a year ago, a thorough search showed it was coming from his back foot. I thought maybe he had just gotten a splinter, maybe had jumped on a piece of wood and pricked himself. I bought some Bag Balm and put on it. A week later, the same thing happened. Same foot. At this point, the cage was clean so he must be biting at it. Always seems to be the same foot. Tends to happen more in the winter than in the spring/summer. I try to be proactive and put bag balm on him, but it still seems to happen now and again.

Maybe you could get some and use it too?

 

[Amethyst]

As said try bag balm, it has antiseptic in it so that should help with possible infection. The easiest way I've found for applying it is, hold the chin upside down by the base of the tail (where the tail meets the butt, it wont hurt him) and rub it on really quickly. Winter time is generally the worst for dry feet since the air is dry do to heating and stuff. You can use blue kote on it, that should help prevent an infection, but keep in mind that stuff stains, so wear gloves. But mostly you are doing the right thing, keep the cage as clean as you can, fleece liners can also help (so long as the chin doesn't chew fleece) since wood chips can stick to wounds. Also flat surfaces can make things worse or cause a problem in the first place, if you just have ledges and shelves try adding some round perches in. Perches apply a sort of rolling pressure over the feet since they have to balance to sit on them, so they don't create pressure points as much as flat things.

 

[Twinkletoes]

Well an update if you care, I haven't found much more blood since this morning. He's still eating and drinking like a fatty. Applying some cornstarch this morning was kind of funny bc he had no idea what it was but knew it was powdery and started rolling in it. As long as it gets on his foot I'm alright with that. Still monitoring him but it seemed to have stopped on its own pretty quickly. Still changing out the fleece linings often and laid some towels outside of his cage for some play time. The glimpses of the wound are appear to be less red and more pink like which I'm hoping is a good sign. Thanks for the suggestions everyone! My bottle of blue kote shows up tomorrow so we will see if I need to use it by then.