Vinnie goes to the vet

Last weekend, when Tom delivered Martin (our new llama) to the farm, he also brought Nick along to shear our other two llamas. It all went very smoothly until Nick discovered a lump on Vinnie's side as he was shearing. Now you have to understand that we haven't sheared our two llamas in a couple of years, so there was a lot of fiber there this year to shear off. There is no way that we could've seen this lump through all the fiber, but now that he was sheared, it was really obvious.

At the time, I kept trying to think whether I had done anything that might have caused an abcess in that place.... I had given them their immunizations for the year, but I knew it wasn't in the middle of his side! I usually give them just behind a front leg, so that the movement of walking will dissipate the fluid of the injection. I couldn't think of anything that might have caused this big lump - it was as large as a good-sized egg!

So, on Monday morning, I called our vet and scheduled an appointment for Thursday afternoon for Vinnie to be seen. Now, taking a llama to the vet is not at all like taking a dog or cat. You can just pop your dog or cat into the back of your vehicle and away you go - the llama, on the other hand, is too big to put into the back seat of the truck. He is even too big to put into the crate that we sometimes put together to transport sheep in the bed of the pick-up. Besides that, how on earth would we load him into the bed of the pick-up?! He must weigh over 300 pounds! So the answer seemed to be our trailer.

This, however, was no minor task.... We had to pick up the trailer from storage, then catch Vinnie out in the pasture and get a halter on him. Our llamas are used to having their freedom, and are not liable to walk right up to you when you are carrying a halter. They are pretty smart - they know the halter is not a good sign. It usually means a shot, or shearing, or any one of a number of not-so-nice alternatives. Yesterday was no exception - Vinnie did not want to be caught! We, on the other hand, had a secret weapon working for us.... We had a bucket with grain in it. Our llamas may like their freedom, but if there is one thing that they actually like more than that, it's grain! And Vinnie, in particular, is a bit on the thin side, so the grain was a major enticement!

Before too long, we had him in the trailer, and Vinnie and I were headed to the vet's. Once we got there, it didn't take long to determine that the lump was not an abcess - it was a tumor. Without cutting it out, there was no way to know for sure what type of tumor it was - benign or malignant. Having just lost Luca a couple of weeks ago, I was not ready to lose another llama! I felt we had no choice but to go ahead and remove it to find out what we were dealing with. I couldn't imagine Vinnie carrying around a malignant tumor without our knowing or doing anything about it.

Thank goodness, the tumor may have been large, but it was benign. Vinnie has a few stitches that will need to come out in a couple of weeks, but generally he is doing just fine. It was amazing how cooperative he was throughout the surgery and the ride home. We need to keep him well-protected by using fly spray for the next week or two, but it looks like our Vinnie will be as good as new once he heals up from the surgery. And let me tell you, I suspect that the next time I show up in the pasture with a harness, Vinnie will likely think twice about whether the grain is really worth it....