Ack! Why did Jackie lose weight?

[Lynx]

No idea. I'm sure he thinks his weighed quite a bit though.

Hope he's doing okay.

[salana]

He's eating quite a bit now. For about two days after the neuter, he didn't eat as much as usual (although his output remained high). He doesn't feel bony or anything, and he's acting normal, much to Suzi's disgust.

He still occasionally sleeps on his side. I don't know if his abdomen feels sore. His incision is completely closed, but I think he still has some undissolved sutures underneath it. No signs of suture reactions, though.

[snowflakey]

Maybe the missing testicles, less food and less gunk up in his anal sac can be added together to make 3 oz.

[salana]

Okay, Jackie's having some interesting changes. First, his butt is no longer gooey. Instead, it's caked with dried poop. Second, and more amazing, he's not overly horny all the time anymore. I held him up to sniff noses with the ladies through the grids. Now, every time he's done this in the past, he's been rumbling and chewing on the grids and generally being pathetic. This time, he chewed a little, didn't rumble at all, sniffed noses, and then started stealing hay from the haybaskets. I know neuters aren't supposed to majorly affect hormones, but is it possible that Jackie had some kind of over-hormonal problem and this has resolved it?

[snowflakey]

One does read people's accounts of neutering super aggressive boars and experiencing behavioral improvement. I know it is anecdotal, but it is possible. You certainly have well-documented adult pre and post neuter behavior.

Are his poops okay? Why is his butt caked with poop? How does he smell?

[salana]

Jackie is settled in with his ladies and is a model citizen. He had a few weeks of bad behavior (constant chasing and trying to hump, dominance squabbles) which resulted in a lot of pee on his face and a small bite on his lip that healed up fine. Yesterday I had them all out for floor time and he didn't bother anyone. There's no squeaking and squawking all the time, and he mostly sleeps under the hay basket or stuffs his face with pellets all day. He does run laps and popcorn occasionally. He seems very happy.

One thing about introducing him. He was very territorial over the hay at first. I think it had to do with him living so long with a lethal that didn't eat hay. He also had some bad manners about humping and sniffing butts. He was kind of allowed to do whatever he wanted when he lived with Einy, because other than running away and sometimes humping back, Einy couldn't do anything about Jackie. Also, Einy didn't care about hay except as a cozy place to sleep, so Jackie felt like it was all his. Now that Jackie was moved in with pigs with teeth, he had to adjust to the fact that 1, they were going to want to eat "his" hay, and 2, he couldn't do whatever he wanted to them without getting bitten or peed on. Now, other than the occasional "chin up" dominance posturing, everything is fine, and he shares his hay.

This might be something to watch out for in pigs that have lived only with special needs pigs, and have to be introduced to others because of the death of the special needs cagemate. Jackie's manners were not what they would have been if he'd been living with a normal pig.

[tcarey]

I'm glad Jackie is doing so well and has learned some new social skills :)

[Lynx]

Sounds like social skills can come in mighty handy if you want to avoid getting peed on!

[salana]

Now if only Suzi would learn the social skills of not being a tyrant.

[JHand]

I am glad to read that Jackie is doing well in his new digs.

My vet does neuters the way your vet does. And according to the rescue I help out occasionaly, they never have abcesses.

[salana]

Wonder of wonders, Jackie now gets along with his mom! They're not bosom buddies or anything, but she's not trying to kill him.

However, Jackie's still having some butt problems. Before his neuter, his butt was all greasy and slimy with white boar gunk. Now, it seems like his slime producing glands have turned off, and his butt is very dry inside. He keeps having dead gray skin peel off of the inside of his butt. He also gets gooey special poop stuck to his dead skin. When it dries (with regular poops glued into it too), and then I notice he has five poops jammed in his butt and gently remove them, the whole poop-special-poop-dead-skin wad comes out in a very uncomfortable, stinky way.

Does his butt need lubrication assistance somehow? Is there some cream that will help him not have so much dead skin sloughing off? Or something that will help poops and special poops slide out instead of staying in and hardening?

[salana]

He's also been put on a diet with severely restricted pellets. It's done wonders for his body condition. Now he enjoys running around the cage and popcorning, and sometimes even stands up on his hind legs without leaning on the cage.

He has a lump on his side that I had briefly mentioned last year. It's grown a tiny bit. It's got kind of the texture of an eraser, and doesn't look any different from his normal skin. He doesn't like having it prodded and poked, but it doesn't seem to cause him any pain.