Drooling around front teeth.

[jennyjoy]

Hi, my name is Jennifer and I'm new here. I've recently taken in two brother degus who needed a new home. Ron & Harry are their names. Anyway, Ron is drooling at the front of his teeth and he paws his front teeth as well. I already have a vet appointment coming up in regards to another issue with Ron (he slightly re-injured his injured tail of which he lost part of a few days before I picked them up). He's not wet around his neck area, he is drinking and eating but not eating as much as I'd like him to. I weighed Ron about 4 days ago @ 177 grams and I weighed him today @ 169 grams. I've been trying to get him to eat some critical care and he takes some but not a lot.
I'm worried that if his teeth need to be trimmed that I'm going to have the same experience with my last degu, Magoo. Little Magoo had teeth issues so I took him in and they put him under sedation to have his teeth trimmed. Anyway the sedation caused him to have these horrible seizures which were difficult to see and he didn't recover fully from his last seizure so I had to do what was best for him and have him put down. I know the combination of being weak, underweight, stress due to the teeth trimming didn't help him.
Even though Ron & I have a vet appointment coming up any advice would be great. I've only had Ron & Harry since the beginning of May and I'm quite attached to them already.
Thanks,
Jennifer

[deguconvert]

What kind of anesthetic was used with Magoo, do you know? There is a gas anesthetic that is less stressful on the body . . . so I would ask for that to be used with Ron if he requires teeth work, if I were you. I think there is certainly that potential. His weight loss is definitely a concern, and you must remember to tell the vet what you have recorded. To help bump him up, you can tempt him with porridge oats (1 Tbsp or so?) and say a dozen sunflower seeds each day. They are carb dense and high fat which he sounds like he is needing at the moment.

[moletteuk]

Hi Jenny, this sounds like quite a serious teeth issue to me, I think they need looking at ASAP with his weight so low. It's fairly standard to sort teeth under Isoflourane gas anaesthetic (degutopia state 2% per min with 1.5 litres NO2 and O2). Because nothing is licensed specifically for degus, vets sometimes like to play it safe or don't get exactly the right dose, so please do discuss the gas anaesthetic with your vet.

[jennyjoy]

Thanks to deguconvert and moletteuk for the advice. Here's the update with Ron....I've been weighing everyday and his weight fluctuates between 169 to 175; however, I'd like to get his weight higher than this! He's eating more than I thought he was so this is good. We went to the vet today and the vet doesn't have a problem with his weight fluctuation...he'd be more concerned if it was going down so I'll be weighing him everyday to keep an eye on him and his brother as well. The vet says his front teeth are nicely aligned. The vet doesn't want to put Ron under unless it's absolutely necessary. As for the drooling in the front...it might be because Ron was on Baytril for a week because of his injured tail and that may have put his system out of whack. Plus Ron did bite me last week when he had re-injured his injured tail and maybe he caught something from me. I'll definitely be keeping a close eye on him. I love my two degus and my two chinchillas; I'd do anything for my little rodent gang!

[deguconvert]

Well, I would recommend that you give him some rolled oats (1 TBSP) and half a dozen to a dozen sunflower seeds every day until you see him getting to a better weight for his age and size, and then wean him off the daily ration. These should help him to gain.