As I was putting the finishing touches on dinner one Monday night in October, my husband burst through the back door carrying one of our two dogs, who was covered pretty much head to toe with porcupine quills. “Call the vet!” my husband called. The other dog followed with a handful of quills in her muzzle and foot. As both dogs furiously shook and pawed at their faces, scattering quills all over the living room, and I rushed to grab my phone, I felt a stabbing pain in my right big toe. I’d stepped on one of the dozens of quills they’d shed. No time to worry about that; we gingerly placed both whimpering dogs into the car and made our way as calmly as we possibly could (which was not very) to Burlington Emergency Vet (after being told by two closer vets to call BEVS).
As soon as we walked in and the receptionist took one look at Luffy, who we’d adopted just three months earlier — face/muzzle, chest, hips, and legs covered in quills — she said into her walkie talkie, “Quills. STAT.” And he was rushed off into a backroom. We waited with Nala, our 12-year-old Australian cattle dog mix, for them to pull dozens of quills (I estimate over 100…the vet tech said she lost count) from her brother before it was her turn.
HEFTY BILL
About three hours and a hefty bill later, we made it back to The Valley to drop the heavily sedated dogs at home to sleep before heading to Central Vermont Medical Center to deal with my own quill misadventure. After a long night in the ER, a follow-up visit with my PCP, a specialist, an MRI, another visit to my PCP to get approved for surgery, and a pre-op appointment at the specialist’s — two months later! — I had surgery on my big toe to remove the dang thing.
Meanwhile, the vet had told us that quills would likely continue to work their way out of the dogs in the coming weeks or even months. And they did. Out of eye sockets, nostrils, flanks, and muzzles. A wound on the top of Nala’s paw got infected and required further vet visits. At the time of writing this, two months to the day after the precipitating event, we have logged seven vet visits (two of them to BEVS, eight doctor’s visits and many bills. Our vet called our saga “the worst — and most expensive — quilling I’ve ever seen.”
WORST QUILLING
Fortunately, our sweet baby Luffy is the most easy-going dog you will ever meet and is taking his continuously surfacing quills in stride. He’s getting plenty of extra treats and snuggles, so he doesn’t seem to mind too much. The challenge, besides carefully extracting the quills we are able to with tweezers, is preventing him from playing rough with the cat and reopening facial wounds.
The two dogs traded the cone of shame for about a month and Luffy and I have had two rounds of antibiotics to Nala’s one. We’re lucky that the quills haven’t punctured any organs, eyes, or caused more serious damage. I’m currently hobbling around in an open-toed boot in winter while my foot heals from surgery, which doesn’t feel that much worse than having a quill in the bottom of your foot for two months. Here’s hoping our dogs have learned their lesson and leave any porcupines they may encounter alone.
