Attack of the Killer Cactus

These monsters line our back 40.

It's killed before. Basketball carcasses litter our back yard. It's also maimed. Ralph attempted to take down just one of its siblings awhile back and came away with scars from its evil, oozing juice. Friday night it claimed another victim.

At 2:00 in the morning we were woken up with sharp cries from the puppy, who was spending one of her first nights outside. We had figured she would bed down with Blue in the dog house, since that's what she usually does (too cute!), but apparently a six-foot tall cactus seemed more appealing.

Blue posing for perspective with some of its offspring. They are well over
six-feet tall and at least five to six feet in diameter.

We actually didn't go out to check on her, as she quieted down really quickly, and we figured she was just crying because she was lonely. She seemed okay the next morning, if a little sad. Since she was still eating and drinking just fine, we left for the funeral after giving her a quick once over. (We were obviously a little preoccupied.) The next day she seemed really tired, and we noticed she was favoring her right front leg. Upon closer inspection, we noticed some sort of hole in her shoulder, and after a little poking and prodding, we were rewarded with a river of puss. Lovely.

Putting peroxide on it made her lick it and then roll in the dirt to get it off, making her look like a rabid dog foaming at the mouth. So it was off to the vet. A little while and $300 later, what was originally proclaimed by the vet techs to be a dog bite turned out to be a cactus wound as the vet extracted the inch-long spike and inserted a drainage tube.

A little blurry but you get the idea: ouch.

Coco was put on antibiotics and we fashioned her a little backwards skirt from an e-collar so she couldn't scratch out the tube.

It's going to be all the rage on the Paris runways this year.

While quite fashionable, the skirt ended up being fairly useless. While trying to push her way through the iron fence (which she'll only be able to do for a little while longer), she managed to rip out the tube and the accompanying stitches. Luckily she did that after most of the drainage was done, and she is healing nicely. Let's just hope she picks a warm body to sleep next to next time instead of a carnivorous plant...

Looking properly forlorn. (Tube was still in at this point.)